No Memory aka The Trial of Emily Fitch
by Circle142
Summary: AU - Accused of a horrible crime and waking up with no memory of the events, Emily Fitch is in desperate need of help. Enter Naomi Campbell - top defense attorney. As the case unfolds, Naomi finds her client complicates her life like she never expected.
1. Prologue

Prologue - Waking up

There was blood everywhere. Emily Fitch peeled herself off the floor with measured movements, blinked once, opened her eyes and shut them again quickly. Jesus.

Her head was spinning. Her ears rang with static as if from an untuned radio fading in and out. Emily pried her eyes open again, blinked, and then was reduced to a coughing fit. Where was she? What happened?!

She found her hands and felt them trail down her face and body - everything was sticky but seemingly intact.

She rolled over to her side and looked around the room. It wasn't home. Some hotel perhaps? She couldn't think about it now - she could only see red in her peripheral vision.

Emily began crawling forward, and every part of her body hurt. She couldn't see things clearly, if at all. The wooden floor on her hands felt slick, yet cold. And yet, she clambered forward.

Suddenly her fingers hit something hard and she wrapped her hand around it, instinctively. She looked down at her hand and saw a large and bloody knife held out in front of her face.

Emily gasped and dropped the blade with a clatter. She deliberately searched around the room for the first time.

That heartstopping moment is when her eyes found the misshapen form about a meter ahead of her. The unnatural position of the body made bile rise in her throat but she couldn't help herself .. she swallowed the lump in her throat and somehow moved toward it. Her eyes fixed on the scene in front of her with an instant of unnatural clarity. It was Gerald.. her Gerald.. on the ground with his eyes open to the ceiling, mouth agape, blood completely soaking his clothing and the floor below his body. She gasped, bringing her hand to her mouth, and staring on what could only be a horrible and impossible dream. But there was no denying it - it was Gerald, dead, mutilated. His slit throat and vacant expression was the focus of a gruesome scene she couldn't begin to absorb in her current fuzzy state. She screamed - unaware if she actually made a sound - and then everything went black. 


	2. Chapter 1 Stop Talking

Chapter 1 – Stop Talking

Emily came to focus in a small and dimly lit room. She vaguely recalled the hours since waking up in blood and the overwhelming sensation of shouting, banging, and people rushing about.

She was there, she knew, curled up on the hotel room floor when eventually the police (or who she assumed were the police) picked her up, took her to the station, and took her blood-soaked clothes. She had only a fuzzy impression of the shadowy figures that examined and photographed every part of her, shouting questions all the while. She hadn't said a word in her daze.

Now, now she found herself alone in a dimly lit room, and the silence was unnerving. She looked up to the flickering florescent light as if in prayer.

She was cold, that much she knew. She glanced down as her hands and pulled against the metal pinning her wrists to the table. Jesus, Jesus, she thought, eyes darting around the small, featureless room. She shifted in the hard metal chair she was sitting on and pulled her legs up close to her chest. She was wearing some kind of drab jumpsuit - the rough fabric chaffing her legs as she moved - and wondered in her head again how she had ended up in this situation. She screwed her eyes closed and took in deep, ragged breaths.

Suddenly, the heavy metal door slammed open. A large gruff man - unshaven, unkempt - moved around the table in front of her with surprising speed. "We have you, bitch," he growled, leaning so dangerously close to her face that she could smell the odor of stale cigarettes and weak coffee on his breath. She turned her head up to face him and blinked, uncomprehending.

This only seemed to enrage the man, his hands suddenly slapping a large folder on the table in front of her. "We have you," he hissed, "your fucking prints are all over the scene. We don't even have to TRY this time." He spat the last part of the declaration as he moved his large frame to the other side of the table and settled in the metal seat opposite. Emily winced at the sound of chair legs scraping aggressively across the concrete floor and fixed her eyes to the floor.

"You just thought you could waltz over here and off the guy without anybody noticing, didn't you?! Didn't think much of the Miami-Dade PD?" he sneered.

On the other side of the room, Emily scrunched closed her eyes as she tried to remember.. all she could think was that that she was days ago on a lush vacation with her husband.. the sun, the beach, the swank accommodations.

This was to be their last one, she remembered, before he was to start on the path to his forever destined political career - his family had money, and expectations - and he wanted to live it up right. She sat in the dank room and tried desperately, but couldn't remember a thing about that night. Sitting in that dark cell of a room, she could barely remember the morning after.

Gerald's family didn't like Emily - this much she always knew. Her sweet disposition was still unable to erase the fact that she was a lower class girl from Bristol, poor in their eyes - unworthy. They tolerated her, she guessed, only because he stopped living like a reckless lad when they finally got together after University - or stopped being so obvious about it anyway.

Her attention was roughly brought back to the man in front of her when he slammed his fist on the table. "Hey! Red! Focus!" he shouted at her.

"Water?" she finally croaked out at no more than a whisper. It hit her all at once that she was desperately alone. She was in a foreign country, accused of some horrible crime, and her eyes finally filled up with tears. She lurched forward in her chair and felt a wave of nausea as the image of the blood-soaked hotel room filled her mind again.

The detective in front of her leaned over the table and shifted on his large feet, face screwed up in a sneer as he prepared to deny her simple request. Suddenly - in some otherworldly act of mercy, she thought - the door to the room slammed open and a forceful female voice said coldly, "Stop talking to my client. Now."


	3. Chapter 2 Injustice

Chapter 2 - Injustice

Naomi Campbell didn't know how she kept getting into this. She ran her long fingers through her choppy blonde locks and sighed. She smoothed the lines of her tailored navy suit - an expensive fucking suit - and flipped through the printed pages again. Her reputation as one of the top criminal defense attorneys in Miami was supposed to help make things right - defend the innocent and somehow end up ridding the world of poverty and injustice and bring about puppies and fairytales or some such nonsense. She did not intend to be called upon as a get out of jail free card for fat British housewives who finally got sick of their husbands watching too much footie or something and popping them while on vacation.

But the consulate had called, and she owed the director there a favor - or many, she quickly thought - given the constant stream of Jammie Dodgers and Branston Pickle he provided her in the godforsaken wilderness that is Miami cuisine to someone who could not tolerate spicy food. For all that Americans obsessed about their weight, she thought often, you'd think they would have the decency to descend into obesity with some decent snack food.

Few details were at her disposal as she rushed to the police department, only knowing Bruce had mentioned something about this needing "her delicate touch" and that it would likely get messy. Or messier, Naomi thought, since the one thing she did know was that most of some fine English gentleman was splattered all over one of Miami's priciest hotel suites. At least his last view must have been nice, she thought cynically. And he probably deserved it.

As the leggy blonde pushed open the doors to the downtown station, she marched to the reception desk with her usual authority. "Here to see.. " she paused as she scanned her notes.. "Emily Fitch?"

The receptionist nodded disinterestedly and began typing on her keyboard with obscenely long nails, making a monstrously unpleasant clacking sound as she worked. Naomi leaned on the counter and bit her lip as she pondered why that name prickled with something familiar. She wracked her brain but concluded that she definitely didn't know anyone named Emily Fitch, that's for fucking sure.

She was lead down the hall - down into hell again, she thought - by a gruff looking guard dressed in one of the ill-fitting uniforms she had come to expect in this place. Even if the Brits didn't send her here often, she was no stranger to this dank and hopeless building.

Stopping, smoothing her jacket and taking one last deep breath, she announced herself by banging her hand on the metal door in front of her. Naomi steeled herself and set her face with the professional sneer that telegraphed everything she felt about government institutions and their inevitable abuse of the innocent.. and the guilty.

She swung open the door and caught a disgusted look from the fat detective leaning over the table, far too close to the small shell of a broken-looking woman with surprisingly flaming red hair.

"Stop talking to my client. Now."

This, this must be Emily Fitch, she thought, quickly taking in the form of a pretty girl who was suddenly looking up at her with panicked brown eyes. As she turned her attention to the manky detective to shoo him from the room, she was left with a bright red impression of the woman in front of her and the word "nonexistent" burning in her brain.

Manky detective turned on his heel and left in a huff. "We'll be back," he growled as he slammed the door forcefully behind him.

Naomi stared at the redhead for a moment, taking stock of the situation. However unsettling she found the other woman's pleading gaze, her practiced defense attorney side soon took over. "Well, you look like a right state," she finally said, setting her leather satchel on the table and turning to her client. "We're going to get you out of here."

The woman that must be Emily looked back at her for a long moment before shifting in her chair and dropping her eyes to the floor. Her handcuffs clanked on the table as she tried in vain to curl in on herself.

"You're covered in blood!" Naomi gasped as she finally focused closely the other woman, wearing an oversized grey jumpsuit that did little to hide the dark smears covering the redhead's bare arms and the crusted streaks visible against her bright red hair, now matted to her forehead. "You need medical attention!"

"They.. they took my clothes," Emily finally gasped, her throaty whisper barely audible in the quiet room. "And I need some water," she choked, tears finally beginning to fall.

Naomi's eyes narrowed. For fuck's sake.

Later, in a secured room of the nearest ER, Naomi ensured that Emily was finally examined.

"I want everything documented!!" Naomi hissed through gritted teeth at the nurse's aide that had the misfortune of receiving the particular assignment of overseeing the treatment of one prisoner - Emily Fitch. Naomi furrowed her brow and gave the trembling fellow one more glare for good measure before she walked out of the hospital room and perched herself on one of the maroon couches littering the hallway. Her eyes left the door and rested on the leather portfolio in her lap, awareness never leaving the space in which her client remained trembling on the examination table.

Moments later, as she crossed her legs and settled down outside the small room, she narrowed her focus and was finally able to begin scribbling notes on her yellow legal pad. Her attention suddenly shifted to a doctor-type, clad in scrubs and a white jacket, glance at her before ducking into the room to spend a brief moment with her new client. She narrowed her eyes at the door but finally convinced herself that her client was only in with the doctor. She cleared her throat and leaned in over her leather portfolio to begin analyzing her case.

Naomi's focus was broken momentarily by the sharp sound of heels breaking the silence and clacking loudly toward her on the hospital tiles. She furrowed her brow and pretended not to notice the interruption until the footsteps abruptly stopped in front of her.

"You must be my sister's solicitor. I'm Katie Fitch."

Naomi looked up from her notes to find herself staring straight ahead into what first registered as a shock of hot pink leopard print, and then higher, a mountain of cleavage. She blinked her eyes and rose to her feet.

"Attorney, technically," she said automatically as she finally stared at the woman's face with the slow realization of seeing someone familiar in the last place you'd expect.

"Oh, shit." Was the only sound that escaped from Naomi's lips.


	4. Chapter 3 THAT Katie Fitch

Chapter 3 - THAT Katie Fitch

THAT Katie Fitch. On the surface she looked like any number of overly tanned, overly made up WAGS sauntering around back home. Standing in the drab hospital hallway, Naomi was struck by the thought that Katie Fitch would fit in perfectly as a native on the Miami club scene, but still looked garish in this light. Shit.

But there she was, standing in front of Naomi in all her overwhelming glory - this famous failed Page 3 girl, lingerie model, one of those novelty celebrities the Brits couldn't seem to get enough of. She was like that tacky Jordan character, she thought, but with the reputation for having a far more venomous temper. Katie Fitch was far more notorious than famous - even Naomi knew that - all these miles away in America.

"Katie Fitch the model?" she managed to sputter out in response to the thinly penciled eyebrow that finally arched in question to her delayed reaction. "I have a mate that fancies you like crazy" was all she could seem to produce, still trying to wrap her brain around this increasingly bizarre situation.

This seemed to please the other woman and she finally took Naomi's outstretched hand in her own.

"You're English! Is he fit?" she said in a breathy voice, with what Naomi could swear was just the hint of a lisp. She suddenly choked on her words and dropped the other woman's hand immediately. Katie was surveying the hallway with a distasteful look on her overly made-up face and hardly seemed to notice.

"I used to be" Naomi answered, wondering how she had gotten herself into this conversation "And I don't know.. I haven't seen him since he was 9."

Naomi's eyes narrowed at Katie's sudden smirk, a cold shiver starting at the base of her spine and causing her heckles to raise of their own accord. "Too bad!" Katie finally exclaimed, appearing slightly bored of the exchange already. "Not enough fit blokes around. Not even in this massive country," she said, spinning around and nearly smacking Naomi in the face with her bright purple extensions. Obviously done with the previous conversation, Katie sauntered over to the hospital room door and let herself in. Like she owns the place, Naomi thought cynically, biting her lip in concentration.

Naomi's head was fuzzy. Had that surreal exchange really just happened? She was never EVER at a loss for words and yet she felt this whole day slipping away from her. She pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration and wondered if this situation could get any more fucked up. She sighed heavily and moved toward to door of the examination room and steeled herself to somehow remedy whatever disaster was taking place inside. Her hand moved to the doorknob and suddenly she gasped, stopped in her tracks as her mind finally linked all the disconnected threads of information.

Her knuckles turned white as she gripped the steel handle tightly. It dawned on her - THAT Katie Fitch. Oh, Jesus. If that.. woman.. she just encountered was THAT Katie Fitch, then the blood-soaked and terrified woman she was somehow representing was THAT Emily Fitch. Wife of THAT Gerald Burton - the poor dead bastard - and for all intents and purposes practically a second Princess Di in the English press. Darling of many, future First Lady, at the very least.

Shit.

Naomi swung open the door and darted her eyes from one nearly identical woman to the other. Katie had her hands on her hips and was glaring down at the shivering redhead in front of her. Emily hardly seemed to notice any of the commotion around her, until the doctor, open mouthed and staring at the scene unfolding in front of him, took a step backward and sent a tray of syringes clattering to the tile floor.

Emily's head jerked toward the sharp sound and suddenly focused on the other people in the room. Her eyes met Naomi's briefly, betraying her shock, before meeting the matching piercing brown stare from her sister. Naomi glanced over and caught the harsh look Katie quickly covered with a sugary mask of concern.

"Katie?" the redhead questioned, her voice breaking. "What are you doing here?"

"You're my sister! You've been missing for three days, Em! Jesus Christ you look awful," Katie scoffed, finally breaking the gaze to run her eyes over Emily's hospital gown and bloody hair.

Emily scrunched up her face, tears threatening to fall again and she focused her eyes on her twin. "Gerald is dead" she choked.

"I know," replied Katie, moving forward as if to embrace her sister, and then suddenly stopping, shifting back on her heels and looking at Emily with narrowed eyes. "We'll get it sorted, yeah?" she finally uttered. And with that, Katie Fitch turned on her impossibly high heel and practically knocked Naomi over as she sauntered briskly out the door.

Naomi squeezed her eyes shut to keep them from rolling sarcastically back in her head as she was automatically prone to do when she felt as though she was losing the handle on a situation. She inhaled a deep, calming breath and cracked one open to glance over at Emily, who - rather than looking devastated as the blonde had expected - was gripping the edges of the examination table and scowling at the ceiling.

"Emily?" Naomi inquired, unconsciously taking a step forward and closing the space between them. Their eyes locked and Naomi felt a sudden, foreign tightness in her chest.

"That's just Katie," the redhead replied in her deep, ragged voice. "She probably fucked some random in the police department to get information."

Naomi raised her eyebrows at the vulgar phrasing. That was the the most spirit the smaller woman had displayed in the few short hours they had been acquainted.

"Well," Naomi countered, "she's right. We'll get this sorted."


	5. Chapter 4 Fellow Countrymen

_A/N – Thanks so much Stokley 27 for the lovely review. Yes, this is channeling CSI Miami a bit, but hopefully this investigation will not be quite so pun-filled as theirs. I actually have this whole fic pretty much fleshed out, so if people are enjoying I will post chapters quite quickly. Let me know and thanks for reading._

Emily had been escorted under Naomi's watchful glare to the lockup - the doctors had thoroughly examined Emily and given her a clean bill of health. None of the blood had been hers and there wasn't anything Naomi could do to help her new client tonight.

After an unpleasant telephone exchange with her supervisor at the law firm - he only stopped screaming when she mentioned that there was family money somewhere (Naomi didn't mention that it wasn't Emily's, of course) - she snapped her cell phone closed and made her way to the hospital parking garage. Sliding into her luxury sedan, she furrowed her brow and wondered if her usual bravado was going to serve her this time. She didn't often take advantage of the close relationship she had with her boss - he knew talent when he saw it and took as much advantage of the associates and junior partners as they did of him - but somehow she felt absolutely no hesitation in using some of her professional capital in convincing him to allow her to keep this case. Something about Emily Fitch had gotten under her skin and she knew herself well enough to be certain that she had to see it through. Although, she furrowed her brow as she eased her car onto the freeway, she recognized that she didn't even understand why herself at this point. At least she knew the head partner couldn't resist her charms, she smirked to herself, and for once that was a good thing.

Naomi made her way through the buzzing streets of downtown Miami - bright lights and constant activity somehow comforting in its incessant familiarity - and she finally pulled her car into the reserved parking spot at her high-rise apartment building and nodded to the doorman. It wasn't perhaps the most *humanitarian* use of her generous salary, but she had to admit to herself that she loved this building. She justified this expensive, exclusive place in the center of the downtown by convincing herself that she needed somewhere to retreat in this crazy city. She told herself that her apartment was a bunker - a war room of sorts - so that she could rest well and therefore fight the battles of the needy and the underprivileged. She didn't think too long tonight, walking through the doors held open for her by uniformed men, how one incredibly rich and aristocratic redhead fit in to her life-long crusade for social justice.

Stepping into the private resident elevator held open just for her, Naomi thought her lifestyle must be working because she was incredibly good at what she did. She had the highest non-conviction rate of any of the junior partners at her firm, and she knew she deserved it. She was making good money and was on fast track to success. She knew she didn't have much of a social life to speak of, but there would be time for that later. Right now, she thought, balling her fists and staring at herself in the elevator's reflective glass, she was primed to fight. And she would need everything she had this time, it seemed.

Riding the elevator to the top floor, mercifully unoccupied other than a nice looking older woman who got on two and off three floors down, her thoughts turned to Cook - her best and probably only friend Cook. They had been inseparable as children and had a connection that was never severed even though they had been on opposite sides of the Atlantic for going on two decades. He would know what to do.

Even though Naomi had been whisked away from England when they were nine, they always kept in touch - first through letters scribbled in crayon and now over infrequent phone calls and frequent emails. Cook had been sending her news from the British press for .. god knows how many years. Even when Naomi could finally access the news herself, thanks to the internet, Cook continued to send his ritual summary of all of England's most important tabloid happenings. _To keep her part of her fellow countrymen_, he always said, when she asked WHY it was that she was required to pay attention to this shite.

So she did - to feel like part of something - and to laugh at Cook's occasional sarcastic commentary, of course. Sadly, with as busy as she was and as much as she just didn't care about inconsequential pop culture in the way that she knew Cook wanted her too, she had stopped paying attention to the content of the messages some time ago. She occasionally scanned a headline or two but mostly just humored his updates with unspecific feedback, for once just being happy for the connection to another human being - her oldest friend. Fumbling with her keys but finally unlocking her front door, Naomi felt suddenly guilty and desperately panicked that she had missed something crucially important this time. Something, she instinctively knew, was about to come back to severely bite her in the ass.

Finally making her way on tired feet and collapsing at the desk in her apartment, she cracked open a beer and logged in to her email. Like clockwork Cook's address popped up with the subject "Shit from England!!"

_Oh, shit Naomikins!_ she started to read, _Big shite happening here. Burton (that rich tosser) got himself whacked and it's all over the place that it's the mousy little wife that did it, eh? That's over in your neck of the woods, yeah? Call me soon, blondie! We have to catch up. Forever wanting in your pants, The Cookie. XX  
_  
Naomi smirked as she scrolled down to the attachments Cook had thoughtfully included in his message. Fucking pervert, she thought, but her smile deepened and reached her eyes because she knew he genuinely cared. She scrolled the mouse over the icon and clicked the picture open. A headline, this one from _The Sun_, screamed THE RED WIDOW WEAVES WEB OF BLOOD over the grainy photo of a tall, handsome man who appeared to be stumbling out of a nightclub. No respect for the deceased, she thought cynically to herself before leaning closer and trying to make out whether Gerald Burton looked like he deserved it. Great defenses have been built on far less, she knew. She sighed, and asked herself what as it with Miami and terribly executed puns? She leaned back from the computer and ran her hands through her blonde hair, knowing she was in for a long night of research and reviewing legal briefs.

Naomi rose from the desk and dumped the remainder of her now-warm beer in the kitchen sink as she began to put on a pot of coffee instead. What the fuck had she gotten herself into? she wondered, watching the dark liquid begin to drip through the hissing machine. She was convinced at that moment that she would never have a taste for Jammie Dodgers ever again.


	6. Chapter 5 Despair

_A/N - Thanks for the kind reviews. For those that noticed, I did edit a "No" into the title as I had originally intended, but everything else remains the same._

At this point in the story, the short and rapid-fire chapters are deliberate, as we're all being thrown into the story along with poor Naomi, but will likely get longer and necessarily more detailed as we settle into the story. So for those of you wanting more, I believe this is the best kind of criticism to be given, so thank you again.

Oh, and anyone not pleased with Emily not being quite gay enough in this tale, I have to say 1.) her husband is quite dead, so I don't see that going anywhere, and 2.) it is indeed all part of my master plan. Be patient, my little fruitbats. ;)  
  
Onward..

Chapter 5 - Despair

The next morning, Naomi arrived at the dingy beige building housing one of the Maimi-Dade women's correctional facilities. Working as many cases as she did, she was no stranger to meeting her clients in various states of disrepair, and yet she always found it unnerving to walk through the gauntlet of heavy metal barred doors as she was lead further and further into lockup. She sat in a plain gray interview room, readjusting her suit jacket that had been carelessly rumpled by an overly handsy guard with a metal detector in his hand and a disgusting leer on his face. She normally wouldn't have put up with such an aggressive display of lechery from anyone, but remembered she was essentially trapped behind five sets of locked steel doors and bit back her scathing retort. She set her portfolio on the bare steel table and shuffled through her notes, and after a moment looked up at the sound of the cell door swinging open. Emily was brought in, lead by a heavyset female guard, and was placed roughly in the chair opposite and her wrists locked again to the table before the guard turned and made a long display of shutting the door behind her, the sound of keys rattling in the lock. They finally found themselves alone and a heavy silence settled over the two women.

Naomi uncapped her pen and inhaled deeply as she took in the silhouette of the redhead seated opposite. Emily was looking measurably better, Naomi thought, now that she was washed and fed and rested. What awful shape she must have been in, she frowned sadly to herself, that a night in this hellhole would noticeably breathe life back in to the other woman. This time, Emily simply looked back at Naomi with a numb expression rather than piercing her with shattered eyes as she had the day before. Naomi looked her up and down across the table and marveled again at how small Emily looked in the oversized jumpsuit and handcuffs - but at least the blood had all been mercifully washed away since last night.

Naomi felt the tightness in her chest again when she glanced up at last and locked on to the deep chocolate eyes. There was something, something more to this girl, and Naomi sighed deeply, trying desperately not to let thoughts like that linger to long. A client is a client, after all, and her job was to fix what they had broken (or not broken, but she knew never to ask about innocence because she just didn't want to know - she taught herself long ago to simply assume they were all pure as the driven snow or she wouldn't be able to look herself in the face every morning.) Naomi shook the thoughts from her head and her practiced attorney side soon took over.

"Emily, listen," she dove in, "I've been speaking with the judge and I think we can get you out of here. Their evidence is all circumstantial at this point.. and considering the state I found you in, they're already on thin ice about their treatment of you. The Brits are watching this one closely, just so you know.. and I really think.."

"Naomi.." the smaller woman interrupted, scrunching up her nose and regarding the blonde woman seriously. "Campbell.. like the model?" the redhead giggled hysterically at her own joke. Naomi's mouth fell open and she stared at Emily in question. She wasn't aware that her client had been lucid enough at any point yesterday to catch her full name, and now, now she was suddenly taking the piss out of the woman who had spent all of the last two days on a crusade to save her from this mess? She wondered if the doctors had missed diagnosing a blow to the head, and the sudden scowl her face must have reflected as much.

Emily's face fell at the piercing blue stare and her eyes returned to the table in front of her, seeming to Naomi to instantly somehow shrink into an even smaller figure. She cleared her throat and tried to think of something to stave off the smaller woman's emotional retreat. "Not the model.. well, yes, but I can't afford to go through mobile phones like she does." She desperately tried to return to brevity as Emily glanced back at her and Naomi could see tears began to form in those brown eyes.

"And you're English? But you're my barrister? In Miami?" Emily squinted back at her and tears rolled freely down her face as she squirmed in her hard metal chair and obviously struggled to make sense of some small piece of this whole mess, at least. Naomi leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table and cocked her head at the question. "Used to be.. moved here when I was nine," she explained, hoping that offering the other woman some context would make her stop sinking deeper into despair. "I worked hard to keep the accent when I realized everyone in this country thinks it makes every word you say sound brilliant." She smiled softly as she realized she was keeping the redhead's attention. "I can lose it if you like," she offered, her tone suddenly turning neutral and flat.

"No! Don't!" Emily practically lunged forward across the table, only to have the shackles at her wrists yank her painfully back in place. The redhead said in a barely audible whisper, "It.. it sounds like home."

Naomi rubbed her long fingers across her brow and regarded the other woman tenderly. _Too tenderly_! part of her brain screamed at her, but she ignored her rational mind for once and gave the other woman a genuine smile as their eyes met again for a long moment. "English accent it is."

"Emily," Naomi finally broke the spell and looked back to her legal pad. "This is where we are. Fill me in on the details, yeah?"

The redhead nodded, looking down at the table, her sinking body language betraying her growing despair.

"We have one dead English gentleman, one English woman in lockup for his murder, and the British Consulate very much not happy that they didn't hear about it for several days. That's why I'm here," Naomi pointed at herself for effect, "and it is my job to defend you against what I have no doubt will be a very nasty murder case. We're just waiting for them to process the evidence and to pick which kind so we can get you out of here. There will be an arraignment in a few days, and then.."

"I don't have any money," Emily murmured weakly. "I don't have anything anymore.."

Naomi frowned at her sadly. "Don't worry about that right now. We'll deal with all that later. I'm yours, Emily, and I'm not going anywhere." Naomi surprised herself with the force of her statement and her breath hitched almost imperceptibly as curious - but not broken - brown eyes met hers.

Naomi cleared her throat and looked down at her notes. She tapped her pen nervously on the paper, before realizing her tick and straightening her shoulders. "Tell me what you remember about the night that Gerald - er, your husband - died."

"No." Her client sighed, leaning her head back and staring up at the ceiling. "I mean, I can't. I can't remember anything. It's just darkness."

Naomi was afraid of that. Afraid that once the scene was investigated and the evidence logged and the coroner's report finalized, that she would be left with a whole lot of nothing and a mountain of evidence to discredit. Not that she couldn't, she knew, especially against the buffoons from the Miami-Dade Police Department - all amber filters and no substance, she often smirked - but she would really just rather not. Cases won solely on picking apart prosecution evidence were awfully hit-and-miss, and Naomi Campbell did not get where she did by taking those kinds of stupid chances. She needed.. something more. "Tell me what you do remember then," the blonde prodded further, "anything will help."

The redhead sat up straight and opened her mouth to respond, but she was interrupted by the sharp sound of keys roughly clattering in the lock and Naomi let out a frustrated sigh as she glanced toward the door. Fucking hell. "Time to go back to lock-up, darlin'," a different heavyset female guard from before curled her lip and cooed in Emily's direction, making the small woman clamp her mouth shut suddenly and cower lower in her seat. At that moment, Naomi really wondered if there was some secret government lab somewhere churning out these brawny and lecherous creatures en masse to fill prison guard and airport security positions across the country. She wouldn't be even remotely surprised.

Naomi didn't even attempt to stop it as her arm moved unexpectedly across the table and took the smaller woman's clammy hand in hers, feeling the cold of the handcuffs still clamping her small wrists together. Naomi bit her lip and ignored the small surge of electricity that seemed to be moving throughout her body at the touch. "It's going to be alright, I promise," Naomi tried her best to sound convincing. For some reason it was important, no, _essential_ that Emily believed her, believed that she would keep her safe. "We'll figure this out. Trust me."


	7. Chapter 6 Drinking or Working?

Chapter 6 - Drinking or working?

With Emily's arraignment scheduled for several days later, Naomi spent the time she wasn't drafting her motions or running interference with her boss to burn through the last half-dozen years or so of weekly emails from Cook. She had saved them all, of course, because that's just something she did, and she now had a more complete idea of how much deep shit she was really in. Several _fucking_ vertical miles of it, she scowled to herself.

As she started with the most recent news and moved ever backwards, Cook's messages enlightened her of the details of the lives she was now intimately involved with - whether she liked it or not. She sat cross legged at her computer, wearing just sweats and an old Columbia Law tee as she pulled her wavy blonde hair back into a messy bun with one hand and scrolled the mouse down further with the other. She rolled her eyes as she scanned yet another Katie Fitch photo spread where little physical detail was left to the imagination and but again, nothing of substance was said about the elder twin. For being such in incredible publicity hound, Naomi thought, it seemed that there was very little actual news that would explain any role she had in her sister's life, and even fewer clues about why she had appeared - ever so briefly - by her hospital bedside.

What Naomi did gather, as she read back even further, is that some years ago Katie Fitch was once the most popular set of tits in the United Kingdom. No, really - Naomi couldn't help uttering a bemused laugh into the silence of her dark apartment - Nutz Men's Magazine had taken a poll and Katie's, ahem, _assets_ came out on top. No wonder Cook seemed so obsessed with her, Naomi thought as she sighed and downed a gulp from another neglected and now stagnant bottle of beer. _Purely_ an intellectual attraction, she was sure.

Despite her rapid rise to the top of Britain's D-list, the Katie Fitch saga seemed to have at one point taken a decided turn for the worst. The tabloids were calling it a meltdown, and the coverage turned increasingly nasty as Katie moved rapidly through quickie flings and drunken fights with a series of footie boyfriends (_a whole bloody team,_ Naomi chastised herself for thinking). It was all reported with a moderate amount of venom - but still nothing awful for the British tabloid reputation - until that is, "the incident" rocketed her from disliked to just plain _infamous_.

From what Naomi could gather from the choppy press coverage, Katie Fitch had been a guest on some popular but irreverent late night talk show, and didn't take well to not being the featured guest of the evening. With her appearance somehow compressed to the last 15 minutes of the show, something had set her off and she had suddenly struck out - breaking some poor makeup artist's nose at the commercial break. Since it was filmed before a large studio audience, there were instantly several dozen Youtube videos of the woman rising from her chair, walking over to the makeup station, and clocking some blonde girl (a Candi, maybe?) straight in the face. The tabloids reported that she had shouted, "I'm Katie FUCKING Fitch" at the time of the incident, and as Naomi watched the jumpy video of Katie sauntering off set and throwing a fierce right hook as the other woman fell like a sack of potatoes, she felt for once that they didn't even exaggerate the situation. It seemed that for no particular reason the elder twin had just gone mental and had beaten this other girl senseless, but even as Naomi searched further she could find no rational explanation. Maybe _just because she fucking could_, the blonde concluded.

It seemed that it was all down hill from there for Katie Fitch as far as the press was concerned, and the woman's increasingly erratic behavior continued to be documented almost gleefully by the tabloid press.

Emily Fitch, on the other hand, seemed to be the polar opposite of her twin and her public coverage certainly reflected it.

The redhead had appeared out of nowhere several years ago when she suddenly appeared at the side of the Burton family's first son - Naomi concluded from her reading that this Gerald person was _the epitome of snotty privilege and class_ and that he no doubt required a woman by his side that magnified, or at least didn't detract from, his status. Naomi wrapped a worn Yale sweatshirt around her shoulders as she took in innumerable breathless articles on the latest high-class events and cutting edge fashions sported by Emily Fitch in her numerous public charity outings. The press seemed - Naomi gritted her teeth and continued to read her computer screen - to now only take the occasional swipes at Katie Fitch for being so unlike her perfect twin.

As much as she hadn't liked the overly-glammed up woman in the few brief moments she had recently spent with her, Naomi still rolled her eyes at the eternal "whore/Madonna" complex forever perpetuated in these rags. For fuck's sake, Naomi scowled and continued reading.

She leaned back in her chair and scanned through endless reports of charity balls and garden parties and photos of Emily Fitch looking proper in tailored suits and large sunglasses. From the poor quality of the bulk of the photos, Naomi got the sense that not only did Emily not court the press, but seemed to actively avoid the whole situation. Only a few grainy candid shots and some awkwardly-posed official event photos were all that seemed to be record the last few years of small redhead that she had somehow agreed to represent.

Naomi paused from her research to study closely a photo sequence of Emily standing next to the tall and handsome man she had come to know as Gerald, grinning in front of the cameras and looking totally in his element. Appearing, as usual, like she wanted to shrink in to the red carpet, Emily Fitch was dressed to the nines in a fashionable outfit and sparkling diamonds that Naomi was sure would set even _her_ bank account back a few months. Naomi tucked her legs up under her as she studied the images carefully - noting that Emily's eyes were cast down in the first image, looked up to Gerald in the second, and struck a radiant smile fore the cameras in the third. Fascinating, Naomi thought to herself, tugging on a loose blonde lock that had somehow strayed in front of her face before tucking it behind her ear and leaning in with a frown. Emily's smile never did seem to reach her eyes, Naomi concluded. Well, not in any of the photos she had seen with the redhead and her husband anyway.

The Burton Family was unspeakably rich, powerful, and connected. Even Naomi – sometimes finding herself unfortunately Americanized - recognized their name. Gerald Burton, she remembered as she read back further, had at one time been a bit of a mess. He had a reputation as a playboy, frequently photographed with a different girl every time he stumbled out of the latest hot London club and often brawling with the paparazzi waiting for him there on the street to document his bad behavior in the middle of the night.

This kind of thing all stopped, Naomi gathered, when one Emily Fitch entered the picture. She scrolled further down through Cook's messages and finally clicked open a digital copy of OK! Magazine from several years ago, taking in a breathless twenty-five page spread of the official wedding album of what was effectively Britain's second royal family. As she flipped through the digital pages, Naomi concluded the whole affair was like one giant fairy tale, and it oozed of money and class and choreographed perfection. Focusing in on a photo of the wedding party, Naomi counted half a dozen members of the Burton family, all tall and blonde and incredibly stoic-looking in the official photographs. Particularly handsome, she concluded, was the man she could now pick out as Gerald Burton, standing straight yet casually in his custom tuxedo and tails, an easy grin spread across his handsome face.

Finally, searching through the festive photographs, her eyes trained on a figure that must be Emily, looking tiny and inconsequential even dressed in a radiant wedding gown. Her splash of bright red hair was darker than it is now, more subdued, but still distinctly like the woman she first saw chained to an interrogation room table. How is it - Naomi wondered - that Emily could be seemingly so overshadowed by nearly every other person present even on her own wedding day?

Naomi leaned back in her ergonomic office chair and bit her lip in concentration. Though she had known the name somehow because of Cook's incessant chatter, she realized that she hadn't ever paid any attention to this Emily Fitch - didn't really know about her other than in passing - because, she concluded, there was nothing there to grab onto. She could hardly believe that the practically invisible woman from these photographs and articles was the same person that had constantly occupied her thoughts and sent her skin tingling at the slightest touch. _Focus Naomi_, she chastised herself, _just a client just a client just a client_. She took another swig of stale beer and rolled her shoulders back as she scrolled further through the pages of the wedding album. It was, expectedly, all staged shots and plastered on smiles. Naomi's jaw ached just thinking about it.

There were Burtons everywhere, set in formal and informal posed shots throughout the photo spread, but she didn't think she saw anyone there who seemed to be for Emily. Did she not have any family present even on her wedding day? The last page of the feature was a casual party photo, capturing Gerald with a loosened tie and a drink raised in a toast, a happy look on his face and one arm around his bride. Emily, Naomi observed, simply looked up at him with an unreadable expression on her face. The photo was too small to really tell, but Naomi didn't think it was a happy moment for the redhead, at least. Her attention, then, was suddenly drawn to the background of the otherwise festive photo, where the unmistakable figure of Katie Fitch was staring daggers at her twin.

She was wearing a white tiger print dress suit and her purple hair was twisted into some kind of ridiculous updo. Naomi furrowed her brow at the sight and wondered where one would even get formal wear like that. It was all too much, too much, and she realized what she really needed was for her best friend Cook to explain. She picked up the phone from the desk in front of her and dialed his number from memory.

As the call connected, Naomi could hear the distinctive sounds of a bar, the glasses clanking in the background as Cook answered the call with an easy hello. Then, the excitement reached his voice as she said his name. "Hey, Cook."

"NAOMIKINS!!!"

"Working or drinking tonight?" she inquired, "I need some help."

"Working, my lovely," he answered, the warm tone of his voice even over the phone line instantly setting her at ease. "All responsible and shit now, yeah? Don't forget I own this dump."

Naomi smiled at his good fortune, in spite of herself. "Oh yeah, congratulations about that. How's Uncle Keith now that he's functionally unemployed?"

"Eh, the old bastard is still wandering off to his appointments about dogs or something, but the pub's doing great. Always knew this place could do with a bit of my touch to really thrive." Cook laughed his throaty chuckle as his affection for his not-really uncle transmitted over the phone lines. "Long time no chat, yeah, Blondie? Finally realized you couldn't live without the Cookie Monster?"

Naomi smirked through the phone. "Something like that, Cook, something like that." Her tone suddenly turned serious. "Tell me about the Fitch twins?" she inquired.

"Eh, finally realized you like the ladies? Well, you have good taste, Naomikins. Damn that Katie Fitch is one fine piece of.."

She wasn't in the mood for his usual teasing and cut him off mid-sentence. "Shut up Cook. I genuinely need to know this time. By some bizarre set of circumstance, it appears that I'm Emily Fitch's attorney. Accused of murder, remember? Burton dead in Miami? Ring a bell?"

"Ah, fuck." was Cook's only response. She could almost hear him gripping the phone more tightly.

"Yeah," Naomi finally sighed, "and first of all - thanks for all that stuff you've been sending me. You, know, your emails, the news. I would be a bit lost without them at this point."

She knew him well enough to know that this would have him grinning over the phone, and Naomi imagined Cook looking immensely pleased with himself as he responded, "No problem, babes. Good for something, ain't I?"

"Of course you are, but you don't need me to tell you that, _studmuffin_," she teased back, "just tell me about Katie Fitch."

"My lovely Katie?" Cook practically swooned over the phone line. "What do you want to know, girl?"

"I met her, Cook. Well, she swooped through and.. made herself known, anyway.."

"Ooh, is she as fine in person as I imagine?" he inquired, now thoroughly invested in this conversation about his favorite subject.

"It was a bit sudden," Naomi responded, "although somehow I managed, in our brief encounter, to tell her about you." She suddenly laughed at how ridiculous it all was.

"Atta girl. Getting me foot in the door.."

"Honestly, Cook, she kinda creeped me out. Why does she seem to hate her sister?"

There was a pause on the line before he finally responded. "Eh, Katie Fitch has a reputation for being a bit shallow, I imagine. Into different things, I suppose?" his voice rose at the end of the sentence and Naomi pushed further, "Is that it?"

Cook paused for a moment and sighed into the phone, obviously thinking deeply about the situation. She smiled as she waited for his answer - at least she didn't feel quite so alone in all this shit for a second.

"I imagine there must be some kind of tension.. a twin thing, yeah?" he finally responded, "Rumor has it that Katie had it in her mind that it would make her ever more popular if they both went into the model business. Two sets of tits for the price of one, yeah? Can't argue with that perfect logic.."

Naomi laughed, in spite of herself. "Cook, is that the Unauthorized Biography of Katie Fitch I hear you flipping through over there?" She was now nearly on the verge of a serious giggle fit.

"No." She heard a grunt and a thud. "Yes."

Naomi suddenly imagined him tossing away the crappy supermarket paperback as he laughed down the phone again. She smirked again - his always good mood was insanely infectious, and that, she often thought, was the main reason she loved him.

"Shit, Naoms!" he said suddenly, "You haven't even seen the sex tape!"

The what? Oh, Jesus.

"Big scandal, babe - oh, yeah, check your email. Call me later, 'k?" and with a click he was gone.

Naomi replaced the phone on its cradle and drummed her fingers on her desk as she stared at her computer screen. After a few moments of absently refreshing the browser, Cook's message popped up. She bit her lip and clicked on the link in spite of herself.

Ugh.. Naomi was suddenly watching a very naked Katie Fitch splashed across her screen in garish night vision. She was bent over a bed, her perky tits bouncing in a stilted rhythm, as she was fucked from behind by a muscular man, their combined moans echoing in a startlingly loud volume through her computer speakers. She lunged for the mouse and clicked pause on the video player. She let out a heavy gasp - hopeful that her quick reflexes wouldn't give that woman in 14-B anything to complain about - and then leaned, almost automatically, in to study the image left paused on her screen.

Katie Fitch, unmistakably Katie Fitch, was left sweaty and frozen in mid thrust, her face screwed up with pleasure.

Naomi nearly averted her eyes, but then looked carefully again at the man in the video - his face was conveniently left just out of the frame, but Naomi noticed the outline of a small but distinctive red tattoo. Naomi's eyes squinted at the imprint of some kind of bird, or logo, perhaps, etched just below his ribs. She couldn't see clearly on the grainy screen shot and Naomi bit her lip as she clicked the video closed.

_Fuck_. Again she was reminded that this wasn't going to be nearly as simple as she'd hoped, well, as much as any murder case could be. She pushed the chair away from the desk and turned her weary feet toward her bedroom. She would not, she decided, swirls of red and purple still flashing in front of her tired eyes, think about how much Emily Fitch resembled her twin tonight.


	8. Chapter 7 Nobody Trusts Anyone

_A/N – Hi kids! Sorry for the delay in updating, life somehow got in the way. Thanks so much to Unknownstuntman for encouraging me to dive back into it – you dangled the promise of some smut like a carrot and you know I just can't resist that kind of thing, lol. This one is for you._

_This story subscribes to the Law and Order school of legal rambling. That is, if it fits the story you want to tell, it's totally great legal precedent and pretty much anything goes. If that annoys any actual attorneys out there, well, enjoy the bit of Naomily banter instead. We should be back on track this week, and we'll finally all get our questions answered. As always, thanks for reading._

Chapter 7 – Nobody Trusts Anyone

Naomi Campbell had just violated about every personal, professional and legal boundary she had ever set for herself, and she couldn't be more pleased. Standing alone in the hallway of the district court, she let herself break into a little dancing shuffle and nodded her head for a moment to some imaginary beat. After some brilliant –and fucking lucky – smooth talking on her part, Emily's bail had finally been granted by the judge moments ago.

She had given up a lot to make it happen, promising the deed to her beloved apartment, the pink slips to two of her three luxury cars, and a significant chunk of her sizable bank balance, but somehow, somehow she made it sound convincing, and Emily would soon be entrusted to her custody. She shifted the thick case folder under one arm and slung her satchel over her shoulder as she strode confidently out of the building and headed for the correctional facility. She glanced over at the small suitcase on the passenger seat, scarcely believing that she had thought to pack some of her own clothing for her client, as if, somehow this impossible turn of events had seemed even remotely likely this morning. Running out of her apartment on the way to court this morning, she had been consumed by a brief moment of panic when she remembered that – if she actually pulled off freeing the redhead – she would be leaving jail without anything to wear, her own blood-soaked clothing now all in tatters in some evidence locker and the property of the Miami-Dade Crime Lab.

Naomi smiled at her own thoughtfulness as she pulled into the fenced lot surrounding the beige lockup building, her spirits considerably higher than the first time she had visited Emily here only a few short days ago. She still didn't entirely know why she was fighting so hard to free a client this time, and shook her head at her own actions as she entered the building and approached the reception desk, pushing the thought from her head and letting herself think that she simply dug in to this case with her usual intensity. As she checked in with the deputy, handing over the official release forms and the small suitcase to the uniformed officer, she ran her mind through the unlikely events that had transpired just hours earlier.

Knowing what she wanted to do the instant she bolted awake dreadfully early that morning, she called Cook in a whirl and set her plan in motion. To his credit, he had actually helped tremendously, sending her an impressive collection of that morning's UK papers scanned in and sent to her email. Dangling copies of the sensational tabloids like a carrot in front of the skeptical and frowning judge, Naomi had dug deeply within herself for her very best debating form, and started in on her passionate plea.

"Emily Fitch can't go anywhere. She has no money, no family in this country, no contacts anywhere. Take her passport. She's so absolutely infamous at this point that SHE needs protection.."

The skinny and balding prosecutor on the opposite side of the courtroom didn't protest, only because he was greedily taking in the sensational headlines that practically crucified her client and made his case for him. Mostly, Naomi knew, he was absorbing the details of the press conference Gerald's family had tearfully held in front of their massive stone estate earlier that morning accusing Emily of taking away their pride and joy while decrying her as a monster, a gold-digger, and for good measure, a whore. The entire family, blonde, stoic, and incredibly well presented even in their grief, panned to the cameras and vowed to do and spend whatever it took to bring their son's killer to justice. The prosecutor was practically salivating at his good fortune, and Naomi barely suppressed an eye-roll under the watchful eye of the judge. _Wanker_, she thought quietly to herself, smoothing her dark suit over her hips and attempting to look completely innocent.

"Erm.. and," Naomi added, "the security costs and logistics of housing a famous prisoner to the already cash-strapped Miami penitentiary system.."

"Point made." The judge cut her off. "She's your responsibility now, Miss Campbell. I don't like scandal and I don't like problems. And I trust that you'll see that she stays out of sight and out of trouble until this trial goes forward, or I will hold you in contempt. Not just a fine, jail time. And DISBARMENT."

Naomi had swallowed hard and found herself agreeing to put up her home, her property, her money, and her reputation, suddenly involved in a client's care like she had never been in her entire life. The thought should have terrified her, but for some reason, she found her lips turning up into a bright smile at the judge and agreed to her terms.

There would also be a monitoring bracelet, and she would be closely monitored and kept under house arrest. _Oh, nobody trusts anyone in this post-9/11 world,_ Naomi thought cynically. Even that small hiccup didn't detract from Naomi's feeling as if she had already won the most important victory - Emily was going to be freed until the trial at least.

Naomi had informed her superiors of the ruling and the rest of her plan, and now she was waiting, mere hours later, in an underground back entrance to the county facility, waiting with nervous anticipation for the small redhead to be lead out the door and come into her sight at last. News of the release had somehow already hit the international wire services, and reporters and photographers had suddenly flooded the front gates of the jail. How, they knew already, Naomi didn't figure, but cursed them all the same. _People suck, the end,_ she thought, leaning back against the hood of her sports car and folding her arms tensely across her chest. She glanced back at the unmarked patrol vehicle that pulled in behind her, giving a small nod to the plainclothes officer as he put it in park and rubbed his moustache disinterestedly.

Her attention turned back to the door at the sound of keys scraping in the lock, and suddenly, her breath was stopped in her chest at her first sight of Emily, lead out in handcuffs by two uniformed officers. The redhead looked at her with eyebrows raised in confusion and what Naomi could only label as mild amusement, and Naomi swallowed hard as her client was uncuffed and walked over the short distance to where the blonde stood, frozen. Naomi had known this plan was ridiculous from the get-go, but had not anticipated that Emily would walk into her custody wearing THAT.

Naomi shook herself from her haze and opened the passenger side door for the smaller woman, giving her a feeble smile as she gestured for Emily to get in. Nodding curtly at the guards and walking around to the driver's side door, steeling herself as she slid in and gripped the steering wheel, Naomi started the engine and shifted the vehicle into drive. She didn't look back in the rearview mirror until she was out of the facility and merging onto the freeway, knowing the unmarked police car was in perfect step a respectable distance behind her. Only then did she trust herself to steal a glance over at Emily.

Of all of the clothing Naomi had desperately shoved in the bag at her apartment, she somehow failed to remember how the world's tiniest pair of white shorts had ended up in the selection, not to mention why on earth the redhead would have chosen those above the three pairs of baggy jeans, sweatpants, or flowing skirts that Naomi had grabbed randomly from her wardrobe. Having only seen Emily in prison jumpsuits up to this point, Naomi was completely taken aback by the sight of perfect legs and perfect hips encased in what she thought might be the world's smallest stretch of white fabric. Swallowing hard at the sudden lump in her throat and trailing her eyes a touch higher, she took in the other woman's tiny, perfect fingers fiddling with the frayed edge of Naomi's well-worn and absolutely favorite Columbia law hoodie. Oh, Jesus. She cleared her throat as she pulled her eyes away and back to the road, before taking a deep breath and looking over again to meet dark chocolate eyes looking over at her with an unreadable expression.

"All right there, Ems?" Naomi asked, suddenly turning pale as they both realized the blonde had let a nickname slip out. And yet, that wasn't even remotely the strangest thing that had come of her mouth today.

"Yes, _Naoms_," the redhead replied after a long moment, her eyes meeting piercing blue as she furrowed her brow in something like exasperation. "You want to tell me what the hell is going on?"

"I got you out," Naomi responded, her confidence returning and her attention turning back to the road. "I'll take that as a 'Thanks' by the way."

"Yes of course, _thanks_, but how? Why? Where are we going?"

"As for how – ugh – you don't even want to know. As for why, you're my client and I'm doing my lawyerly duty to see that you make it to trial in one piece." Naomi's hand left the steering wheel to dig between the front seat, producing a color page printout and handing it to the other woman.

Emily's eyes lingered for a long moment on the _Daily Mail_, dated earlier today, with a photo of the entire Burton family spread out in front of their palatial home and reading some kind of speech. In the corner, splashed under a headline that cried RED DEATH – BURTON WIFE TO BE CHARGED WITH MURDER, Emily recognized a picture of her own face, obviously taken with a telephoto lens as she scowled at someone with a look of fury splashed across her face. This wasn't good.

"Right. Shit." Emily slumped over in her seat for a moment before turning back to the blonde with a sigh.

"Anything else I need to know?"

"Well, you're going to have an ankle bracelet to monitor you until the trial – house arrest kinda thing. Won't be able to stray too far, sorry.."

The redhead folded the newspaper back up and leaned back in her seat. At this point, she decided, after waking up in her husband's blood, spending most of the last week in a foreign prison, and somehow at last being valiantly rescued by a mysterious blonde knight in attorney's clothing, Emily just closed her eyes and sighed. She just went with it.

"Is that all I need to know?" the smaller woman questioned, cracking open one eye and staring at the blonde.

"Yes," Naomi said seriously, gripping the steering wheel tightly, "one more thing. You'll have to lay off all that cocaine while the ankle monitor is on. They can tell that kind of thing.." Naomi glanced over at the redhead, a small smirk forming around her lips.

"Cheeky!" Emily squeaked at her, batting the blonde's closest arm with the hem of her sweatshirt. "Making all kinds of assumptions about my character, aren't we?"

"In more ways than one," the Naomi replied, chewing on her bottom lip thoughtfully. Emily stared at her for a long moment before frowning and bouncing up in her seat. "You never told me where we're going."

"Oh, well," the blonde replied at last, her hands shifting the powerful car into a higher gear, "we're going to my Mum's." 


	9. Chapter 8 Mrs Campbell's

_A/N – As a thank you for all the lovely reviews, here is a speedy update. Special thanks to LuvActually for sending a nice message, which really makes a novice like me feel touched by fanfiction royalty! Wizzer! And of course, thanks to Mr. Fishy for the assurance from a few chapters ago that my ideas are coming through. I've never actually written fiction before (I brought vodka, is that right?) so I'm glad at least some of what's in my head is actually translating to the page._

_I should have another up tonight or tomorrow at the latest – darn daylight savings time keeping me awake is bad for me, but good for staring at the ceiling and getting ideas. Again, thanks for reading._

Chapter 8 - Mrs. Campbell's

Sometime in the forty-five minutes that had passed since they left the city, the redhead and the blonde had settled into a comfortable silence as they drove on. Naomi had finally forced herself to stop stealing glances at the other woman, and set her eyes intently on the road winding in front of her, the palm trees and long stretches of tall grass replacing any sort of signs of civilization as they continued.

Some miles ago, Emily had suddenly reached over and pushed a series of buttons on the BMW's control panel and then shifted back in her seat again. Instantly, Naomi felt the roof contracting and the wind suddenly blowing her unruly blonde locks back into her face. She glanced over at the redhead, now enjoying the feeling of the top down by placing her legs up and resting her bare feet on the dash as she leaned back and closed her eyes with a sigh. Naomi let her eyes linger on the peaceful form of the smaller woman, her red hair whipping in the wind and the sunlight shining on her rosy cheeks.

The blonde smiled to herself as she reached for a large pair of sunglasses from the sun shield in front of her and fixed her eyes back on the road, both women lost in their thoughts as they reveled in the feel of the warm breeze surrounding them.

Naomi Campbell wasn't gay and she wasn't straight - she wasn't anything really. She enjoyed a rumble as much as the next girl, but since her college days at Yale and certainly since her law school days at Columbia, such _interactive _events had gotten fewer and further between. She would have felt pathetic at her increasingly lonely life, but she knew she was far from the only one as 80 or 90 hour work weeks were simply the expected standard for all new associates. Naomi knew few fuck-buddies and even fewer relationships survived even the first year, most new lawyers inevitably choosing a few precious hours of sleep when not in the office. When it came to crashing for two or three hours a night or spending time with significant others, boyfriends, girlfriends, pets and even children were always falling a distant second. _Harsh but true_, she thought, and all the more reason to avoid the problem all together by throwing herself into work - at least those risks and rewards could be measured concretely. Honestly, she admitted, she was not that bothered by the solitude her career seemed to demand, her sexual urges easily managed - on the rare occasions they appeared - by brief tumbles with her own expert hands.

Naomi reddened slightly as she stared at her hands on the wheel in front of her, gripping her knuckles more tightly and kicking herself for even letting her thoughts wander that way while so close to the suddenly scantily clad woman and her tantalizingly bare legs dangling on the opposite dash. The blonde took a quick peek over to find that the redhead had opened her eyes again, her elbow propped up on the car door and her hand flowing in waving motions as she played with the wind flowing through her fingers. Emily leaned her head down to rest on her shoulder as she considered again the unlikely events that had led her here, to this very moment.

Emily had spent the last two days in solitary, and the silence had been unnerving - not even the rotating cast of seemingly identical guards had spoken even a word to her in all that time. She didn't understand why, why she had been suddenly yanked from the general population as she stood in the lunch line with a thousand other desperate women and locked away in a tiny 8 x 8 cell by herself. Now, thinking back to the newspaper printout she had shoved back between the seats, she knew - she was a hated woman. Of course Gerald's family would be out for blood, she thought bitterly, of course they would come after her in one way or another. She hadn't even had the chance to figure out for herself what happened, and now it seemed that her in-laws, nay, her entire country had turned on her. All save one.

Naomi had, in the first fuzzy image Emily could remember of her as she had slammed the interrogation room door open and pulled the aggressive detective out of her face, seemed fierce and demanding, but to the redhead she had been kind. _Sincere_, Emily thought to herself, something she hadn't encountered in a very long time, if ever. Her own family situation and certainly British high-society was no place to make friends or find people you could depend on. She certainly didn't know anyone, that's for fucking sure.

Emily sat up straight in her seat again as Naomi slowed the car and turned up a gravel path through a large iron gate. She looked with wide eyes as they pulled up to what she assumed was Naomi's mother's house - a huge gray stone building covered in patches and tangles of ivy. Though it seemed small compared to anything Gerald's family resided in, the redhead gasped at the waves of color present from what must be thousands of flowers in front of the house and splashed down the sides of the lawn. She caught a glimpse of a bee buzzing in the sunlight, and then a sliver of the clear blue ocean crashing in gentle waves in the distance. Emily Fitch thought it was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

The small woman was suddenly pulled from her visual trance as Naomi walked from the back of the car, several bags slung over her shoulders, and pulled opened the door for the redhead. "Out you pop," she said, gentle smile on her face. Both women looked back as the unmarked police vehicle pulled to a stop behind the sports car, the deputy removing a large case from the trunk and sniffing through his mustache as he walked up to them wordlessly. The redhead eyed him warily and slipped her feet back into the slightly-too-large tennis shoes she had left on the floor mat of Naomi's car, before shutting the car door and crunching up the gravel behind her. As the three of them walked inside, Emily took in the beautiful mahogany floors and sage-colored walls covered in art as she followed close on the blonde's heels as she confidently strode into what must be the kitchen.

The room was full of light, the large back windows providing a view of a small garden full of purple flowers and in the distance, a small dock jutting out into the calm blue sea. Emily turned away from the beautiful view to take in silver appliances and granite countertops, the smell of something warm and spicy bubbling on the stovetop overwhelming her senses.

"Mum!" Naomi shouted, "MUUUUUUUUUUM!" before waiting two beats for a response and then shrugging her shoulders at the other two. The bored looking deputy set his case down on the counter and snapped it open. He looked over at the taller woman and she nodded, her mouth pulled into a thin line and her brow furrowed.

"Right," he said, turning to Emily and holding up a hard plastic strap with two black disks and a small green light, already glowing, "This is your monitoring device. It's heatproof, waterproof, and tamper proof. If you somehow find yourself outside the 200 yard radius from this base station, we will call you on this phone," he pointed to an old rotary line hanging on the kitchen wall. "If you do not answer the phone within two minutes, you will be in violation of the terms of your release, and you will be arrested. Understand?"

Emily glanced over at Naomi's frown for a brief moment before she nodded, because really, what choice did she have? She watched as the deputy knelt beside her and snapped the cuff to her small ankle, adjusting it to a slightly uncomfortable tightness.

As the officer set the base station on the kitchen counter and left the house, Emily was still staring down at the dark bracelet, feeling for all intents and purposes like a chain was clamped to her bare leg. Though she never felt particularly free, at least her usual shackles weren't quite so literal, and as she realized she had spent most of the past week locked together or chained down to something, tears threatened to form in her dark brown eyes. The quivering of her lip didn't go unnoticed by Naomi and she clapped her hands together softly before the other girl could cry again. "Right, now that's sorted. Tea?" she asked.

The redhead's eyes opened wide and lit up at the thought of a proper cup of tea - her first one in weeks - after what seemed like an eternity of bad prison food and weak coffee, if she had been given anything to eat at all. Her stomach rumbled loudly in the silent kitchen, making her turn a red only a slight few shades lighter than her hair. She hoped the blonde hadn't noticed.

As Naomi turned to fill the kettle in the sink, the glass door slid open and the kitchen seemed to suddenly be filled with even greater warmth as a lovely-looking older woman stepped into the room. Her loosely curled blonde hair was a shade darker than Naomi's, Emily observed, and she was wearing what looked like a wildly-pattered tribal caftan around her small frame. The two blonde women smiled at each other. "Hi Mum," Naomi greeted her warmly, "this is Emily."

The older woman turned toward the redhead, now looking her up and down and taking in what looked like her daughter's ratty sweatshirt, no pants at all, and some kind of electronic monitor resting on one ankle over ill-fitting shoes. She glanced over and raised an eyebrow at her daughter before turning back to face the smaller woman. "Lovely to meet you, Emily. Gina" she finally said, pulling the startled redhead into a warm hug. "Nice to see my daughter is still taking in strays. Although she doesn't usually bring them all the way home with her.." __

What is she wearing? Gina mouthed to her daughter over the redhead's shoulder, still holding her in a tight embrace.

"Emily is going to be staying with you for a while. We both will," the younger blonde informed her mother, scowling at her mother's question and ignoring her teasing. _Like you're one to judge fashion_, Naomi thought to herself. She loved her mother, really did, it was just, just.. "But darling!" Gina exclaimed, "I'm off just now to my Original Woman's Solstice Retreat - it's June, remember? I'll be gone a month like always." She finally released the tiny woman from her overwhelming embrace and moved to make her way out of the kitchen.

Naomi rolled her eyes warmly, if that was even possible, and nodded. "Emily can stay anyway, yeah? She's a bit, erm, attached to the place at the moment," the blonde indicated down to the redhead's newly-placed ankle monitor as the smaller woman flushed bright crimson with embarrassment.

Gina Campbell nodded without a hint of hesitation. "Of course dear! I'll just call Pedro and tell him not to bother stopping by. He never tends the flowers properly anyway and I think I've seen him using _chemical fertilizer_," she almost whispered in horror. And then with a swirl of alarmingly bright fabric, she was gone up the stairs.

A few long moments later, Gina watched silently from the kitchen doorway as she observed her daughter eyeing the smaller woman intently. Emily was now propped up on a stool in the kitchen island, as she closed her deep brown eyes and savored the cup of hot tea her daughter had just placed in front of her. She had never seen Naomi's eyes drinking in something with so much intensity, and knowing her fiery daughter as she did, that was really saying something. She could only hope that this - situation - her daughter was in was still in her control, because the look in her piercing blue eyes suggested she was far from it at this very instant.

Gina, however, loved her daughter and knew her too well than to ask her those sorts of questions at a moment with seemingly such _awful _and _wonderful_ potential as this. She wished them both luck with silent lips and closed the door softly behind her.

Hearing the click of the lock and realizing they were alone once again, Emily gripped the sides of her now-empty mug tightly and looked up at Naomi, catching her looking back intently. The redhead creased her brow and scrunched her mouth up to the side, chewing on her lip as she stared back for a long moment as if trying to figure out a particularly difficult puzzle. Finally, she broke the silence, "Is it really okay I stay here? Not that I can really do much about it at the moment, but.." Naomi put up a hand to silence the other woman with a sigh. "Well, really, it's my house anyway. Well, _technically_. Mum doesn't believe in property ownership.. or she just wants me to pay the taxes, anyway. It's fine." As if that explained everything.

Naomi turned away from Emily's still-confused stare and moved to dish out two bowls of the steaming vegetable soup from the bubbling pot on the stove top. The blonde placed one in front of Emily, who eyed it hungrily, and sat down on the other side of the kitchen island, picking up her own spoon. They each stole glances at the other as they ate in silence. 


	10. Chapter 9 You Want Me to Think

_  
A/N - Ok, so I just realized they spent most of the last chapter "eye-sexing" each other without a lot of action. This chapter will remedy that, and oh darlings, I have been inspired and have I got some amazing twists and turns coming up for you. This whole story is now coming together, and if it makes you happy (it makes me so very happy) we should have resolution to Season 4 AND this story within the week. Again, thanks for your reading, favoriting, feedback, and general dirty thoughts.  
_

Chapter 9 - You Want Me to Think

Placing their dishes in the sink, Naomi wordlessly took Emily's hand and pulled her off the kitchen stool. Leading them past a cozy living room, overstuffed couches and a stone fireplace looking exceptionally inviting to the increasingly sleepy redhead, she found her feet following Naomi's up a wooden staircase, the framed photographs lining the walls catching her attention. She let herself be pulled forward anyway, but Emily promised herself she would come back to examine them later.

Naomi stopped at the second door past the top of the stairs, and gestured for the redhead to enter. "This is my old room. I'd give you the master bedroom, but I'm afraid I feel the need to take my Mum's since I don't know what embarrassing hippie crap she has laying around." The blonde smirked at this last bit, her affection and exasperation with her mother apparent to Emily in equal measure. She gestured towards a worn wooden dresser practically overflowing with what looked like plaid shirts and hints of some bright floral fabrics.

"There are clothes in the dresser," the redhead's eyes followed Naomi's hand to where she was pointing. "It's all old stuff but at least some of it should fit you." The blonde turned back to the smaller woman, who was visibly swaying on her feet now, and gave her a half smile. "Clean up, rest up, yeah? I'll leave you to it."

Naomi turned away and slowly shut the door behind her, leaving the redhead alone in the blonde woman's old bedroom for the first time, exhausted but undeniably curious.

Emily clasped her hands behind her and took a long look around the room, trying to get some idea of the person it had once belonged to as she yawned repeatedly and rubbed her tired eyes. She peeked under the bed, purely out of anthropological interest, and saw what looked like an abandoned bottle half-full of vodka, a stuffed pig with one eye and no legs, and a small army of dust bunnies. This whole place - no - this whole life was turning out to be a complete tumble down the rabbit hole, she decided. The small woman pulled back the heavy down duvet, catching a small hint of vanilla as she fell into the bed, exhausted, red and gold swirling behind her eyes as she fell into a dreamless sleep.

When Emily finally opened her eyes again, she was met with darkness, and a sudden panic set in until she gripped the soft pillow underneath her head and remembered where she was. Not prison, not covered in blood, instead in Naomi Campbell's childhood bed - in her childhood bedroom - wearing Naomi Campbell's well-worn clothes. She pulled herself from the soft sheets with a grunt, the hard cot she had been sleeping on for the past week still leaving it's mark on her sore body, and headed across the hall in the darkness to what she assumed was a bathroom. Flipping on the lights and turning up the hot water to full strength, she stripped out of her shorts and Naomi's sweatshirt and stood under the scalding blast until the heat faded and the water turned tepid.

Wrapping herself in a fluffy green towel, Emily crept back to the bedroom, listening intently for any sound of the other woman, until she slipped back into the darkened bedroom and began ruffling through the chest of drawers. Lit only by moonlight, the redhead picked out a dark pair of shorts - an extremely small pair of shorts, she smirked to herself - and a baggy t-shirt with some faded band logo and pulled them on.

Emily crept down the stairs, her wet hair leaving droplets on her t-shirt as she moved, until she finally spied Naomi at the kitchen island, bent over an impressive-looking silver MacBook and typing intently. She let her eyes linger on the blonde woman's lithe body, taking in a worn blue shirt hitching ever so slightly over gray running tights that ended just below her knees, suddenly realizing she had never seen her attorney in such casual - and form-fitting - attire. Emily would have, should have, averted her gaze - but her sleep-filled head couldn't help but stare. She thanked her quiet feet that Naomi didn't seem to notice her yet, and she stared for a moment longer until she caught the glint of something large and silver threaded through the blondes' long fingers, and she found herself finally moving forward to get a closer look.

"What's that about?" The smaller woman finally asked in a husky, sleep soaked voice, her curiosity getting the better of her at last.

Naomi glanced over briefly and saw that a freshly-showered Emily had appeared out of the darkness and was staring down at her favorite skull ring. "It helps me think," she said simply, teeth clasped around a pen on one side of her mouth and returning her eyes to the laptop screen as she continued punching keys. "I'm thinking that you're going to want me thinking.." she stopped typing and looked at the redhead pointedly, "since this is the rest of your life and all."

Emily swallowed audibly and perched herself on one of the bar stools. "The police reports are going to start arriving by courier sometime tomorrow, so don't be startled if there are suddenly large boxes blocking the entryway," Naomi continued, seemingly unaware of the other woman's discomfort. "Like on all large trials, I will be working with some other associates in my firm, and they're keeping me updated." Blue eyes were suddenly upon her with all of their previous intensity. "Are you ready for this?" Naomi finally asked her, and not waiting for a response before she continued, "let's start at the beginning."

Emily accepted a steaming mug of tea from the blonde, noting with a tiny surge of shock that the other woman hadn't asked her how she took her tea -two sugars and a splash of milk - after she had made her a single cup earlier in the day. She had simply remembered. Jesus.

"So," Naomi began, ignoring the redhead's teeth suddenly appearing and biting her perfect lips, once again lingering tensely on her bottom lip, "Why were you in Miami in the first place?"

"Gerald," the smaller woman responded, as if that was adequate explanation, catching the skeptical look from the other woman she elaborated, "Gerald wanted one last wild experience before he declared for office." Emily looked briefly back into piercing blue eyes before she continued, "From here on out, it was going to be all.. political fundraisers and redheaded babies." Naomi scrunched her nose up at this imperfect answer, "and how did you feel about that?"

The redhead shrugged noncommittally, before she let slip, "we hadn't quite figured out the logistics yet.." before seemingly realizing what she had said and suddenly clamping a small hand over her mouth. Naomi seemed to ignore the awkwardness radiating from the smaller woman and simply raised an eyebrow in question, "were you happy? Did you love him?"

Emily turned to face the blonde at last, her eyes narrowing in accusation. "Are you asking me why I was with my husband? That's a bit forward, even for you."

Naomi furrowed her brow and sighed deeply before she responded a moment later. "It would have been forward had we not found ourselves in this situation, where you are electronically chained up in my kitchen and I'm the one responsible for figuring out how to keep you from rotting in prison for the rest of your life. Now, now I think it's relevant to my interests."

Emily swallowed hard, her eyes glued longingly to the small sparkle of mica in the counter top. She refused to look up and meet the blue eyes she knew were boring into her. "Alright then, why does Gerald's family hate you?" The blonde kept pushing.

"I wasn't ever good enough for him," Emily finally responded, "he was going to be famous, and it was awful to them that he would even look at me. Until I was the wife, and they really let me know they couldn't stand it that I wasn't like them – rich.. and important.. and worth something.." her voice trailed off sadly as she dropped her eyes once again to the floor.

Naomi frowned at the phrasing, "Worth something? You're definitely worth something, Ems," she responded softly. There it was again.. that kindness. _Sincerity_. The redhead couldn't wrap her brain around it and continued looking away in silence.

Naomi sighed and took a different tack; she turned back to the laptop in front of her and clicked open a wedding photo. "What's this?" she asked quietly. The redhead looked quickly over at the screen, remembering the moment pictured, and then glanced away. "Katie just can't stand having anyone else the center of attention," she finally replied.

"Katie. Tell me about Katie," Naomi inquired as she clicked through to some new videos and copies of newspaper headlines that Cook had forwarded to her just that morning. It seemed that after Katie had breezed past her in the hospital corridor, the purple-haired woman had returned to London and embraced her "proper" place in the in English talk show circuit, her fame somehow now greater than ever. The fickle public had seemingly forgiven her - following her beloved twin's spectacular public downfall, that is - and it appeared that she had again gained somewhat of a cult following. _Like she should start her own religion or something_, Naomi thought cynically, now that there was actually evidence of some twisted kind of renewed interest in Katie Fitch, and she knew somehow that the D-list celebrity was milking it for all it's worth.

Naomi stood - shutting the screen of her laptop violently - and sighed in frustration at the lack of response she received from Emily just now. She was getting angry. She ran her fingers through her messy blonde locks as she grunted in the redhead's direction. Emily had seemingly resigned herself to opting out of any kind of interrogation session for the moment, her eyes remaining glued to the floor. Naomi busied herself making them both pickle and cheese sandwiches and pouring them each a small glass from a single bottle of beer. "Working, not drinking tonight," the blonde answered Emily's unasked question as she handed the cup to the little redhead, "but this should help you relax a bit." Her voice was still tense.

Naomi opened her laptop again and clicked the mouse with what felt to Emily as an uncalled-for aggression. Naomi looked over at the redhead and frowned, her patience running thin at last. "I'm going to speak with my friend Cook," she stated, her eyes narrowing and shoulders jutting back, "he'll sort this out."

Emily looked back at Naomi with wide eyes, seeming again to not absorb the words the blonde had uttered in her direction, preferring once again to send her attention to the floor. Only once the video feed was connected did the redhead shift uncomfortably on her bar stool and raise her eyes to the laptop screen. Cook's wide and grinning face suddenly appeared as the feed connected, his own mastery of technology finally fascinating him and spurring him into a genuine and overly-enthusiastic smile. Emily could not help but grin back as Naomi Campbell looked at the screen with such intensity - such happiness - at the sight of her oldest friend.

"You fucking bastard.. after all these years you finally think I'm worth a new laptop.." the blonde teased, genuine affection shining in her eyes. Emily looked observantly from the blonde beside her to the sandy-haired bloke grinning down the computer screen at Naomi. She found that her chest tightened, altogether unexpectedly.

"Oh, shit, Blondie," the other man had screeched down the video feed, "is that a Fitch in your kitchen?" The blonde glanced her way with an apologetic stare as she moved at Cook's urging and wrapped her arm around the slight redhead perched beside her. "Emily Fitch," Naomi introduced, "meet James Cook."

Emily frowned as her Naomi - her stoic, brave, and kind Naomi - grinned like an idiot at some wanker over the computer screen. The redhead stared and only recoiled slightly as Cook yelled, "Touch her!" to the blonde woman through the microphone. "Cook, Jesus, fuck off.. " the blonde automatically responded, albeit with a smirk on her face.

"Oi! Girl, you're not Katie Fitch but you're close," the sandy-haired man had leered. "I fucking fancy that bird so much.." he went on. Emily looked pointedly away. "Of course you do," she muttered her retort so quietly even the woman sitting next to her couldn't be sure she heard it. "Nice to meet you, Cook, I've.. got to go upstairs and.." Emily didn't finish her sentence before she was out of the kitchen and beyond the door.

"Eh.. Naoms, be careful with that one," Cook uttered at his oldest friend, looking concerned over the video feed at his mate being suddenly left by her client at the kitchen table. "Sleep with one eye open, yeah?"

"You're not helping, Cook," the blonde finally uttered, face screwed up with puzzlement. "Hey, you've done some investigating before, haven't you?" Naomi asked her friend in all seriousness. "You'll look into this won't you Cook? I need to know.. about the Fitches. I need to know." The blonde's words were uttered as if in finality.

Emily stood in the doorway, catching the end of the broadcast conversation before turning and creeping silently back to her room. He couldn't.. _oh, god_, what if he did? What if he found out about what happened in Bristol? She knew - as she buried her head under a pillow, desperate to keep her sobs muffled in the stillness of the warm night - that if Naomi discovered her secret, this whole world would start to come undone and everything would crash down around her again.


	11. Chapter 10 Secret

_A/N - Honestly, I was going to work a little longer on this one but I got way too excited for you to all know what Emily's been hiding.. promising the next chapter (and fall out from this one) is coming tomorrow morning at the latest. _

Chapter 10 - Secret

Naomi didn't see Emily anywhere as she searched throughout the empty house, but she didn't hear any beeping and the phone stayed silent. She had to be close. Walking into the kitchen, she finally she spied a splash of red against the blue of the ocean as she slid open the back door and stepped out into the garden. Walking with bare feet down the sloping path, she savored the way the smooth clay felt cool underneath her feet as they carried her ever closer to the water's edge. She raised one eyebrow as she took in the form of the small redhead, who was laying face down on the very closest edge of the dock, one leg stretched awkwardly behind her on the grass.

"Comfortable?" Naomi asked her, the amusement in her blue eyes reflecting in her voice as she looked down at the smaller woman. Emily, her eyes closed and face pressed flat on the warm wood of the dock, didn't move as she answered in a quiet voice, "I can't reach the water. This is as far as I can go before this thing turns yellow and starts beeping."

Naomi glanced again at the bare leg that was stretched back toward the house, noticing instantly the redhead's ankle bracelet now visible through the long grass, green light steadily glowing. "Jesus, Ems, that's kind of pathetic," Naomi chuckled, rolling up the sleeves of her t-shirt and setting herself down on the dock beside the other woman. She tucked her bare legs under her and leaned back, blonde hair cascading in loose waves down her shoulders as she turned her face up into the warm sun. Emily scowled and rolled over to face the blonde, part of her wanting to give the other woman a sharp poke in the ribs for not appreciating her misery, but her anger was instantly dissipated as her breath hitched in her throat at the sight of Naomi glowing in the sunlight, the clear blue water sparkling behind her. The redhead pushed herself up so she was leaning on her elbows, careful not to move her foot from the appointed position as she wiggled her toes in the grass.

"I was just thinking," Emily started, her fingers fidgeting with the hem of her shorts, "that across all that water is England, and that ever since Gerald and I arrived in Miami all I wanted was for our trip to be over and to be able to go home, like that was something real and this place wasn't."

"If you're trying to get back there from right here, I think you're severely overestimating your ability to swim."

The redhead's brown eyes locked with the other woman's just then, the smile Naomi was desperately trying to keep off her lips making her eyes sparkle even brighter blue than the sea behind her. Emily snorted with laughter for a moment, surprising them both, before swatting Naomi's bare arm lightly with her hand. "I was being serious!" she almost squeaked, and Naomi couldn't help but find this version of Emily completely adorable, her face turning various shades of bright red like her hair when she was embarrassed, her blush creeping all the way from her neck to the tips of her ears. Naomi turned her attention to brushing sand off the dock underneath her, refusing to let herself stare too long at the white tank top and skimpy shorts the redhead was currently sporting, leaving very little to the imagination.

"Home isn't there anymore anyway," Emily sighed, leaning her head back on the wood and folding her hands in front of her across her stomach. She knew questions would follow.

"Tell me, Emily. Why were you with him? You didn't sound terribly convincing when I asked if you loved him, and I wasn't just being a prick. It would make my job a hell of a lot easier if you did."

"Why?"

"Um, people hopelessly in love with each other don't generally go killing each other off, now do they? Well, not ideally, anyway.." Naomi trailed off and a heavy silence settled over them like fog.

"I did love him," the redhead finally, her tone even and her body still, "he was my husband."

"He had quite the reputation," Naomi pushed, "as a bit of a lad?"

"It didn't bother me." Emily said quickly.

"Are you sure? Or you just didn't know?" the blonde fired back.

"My relationship with Gerald wasn't always easy," the smaller woman sounded irritated now, "I know he cheated on me. I'm not stupid."

"I never said you were stupid," Naomi responded softly, "I just needed to know. Motive and all that.." The blonde looked down at her hands, her eyes following the patterns her fingers were tracing on the weather-beaten wood as she fought to keep any traces of disappointment from her voice.

Emily stared at the taller woman for a long, questioning moment before she answered in a low voice. "We were.. complicated. He gave me a home when I needed one."

"How long has it been since you've been back to Bristol?" Naomi asked after a long silence.

"Ages," Emily said quietly, trying to hide the sudden lump in her throat at hearing the name said out loud.

"I haven't been back for ages either," the blonde responded, after a measured pause.

Emily was grateful that Naomi seemed satisfied to leave it at that, and allowed herself at last to steal a glance at the other woman, seemingly lost in thought and biting her lip in concentration. Emily turned back over the other way and stared out into the sea, listening to the waves breaking with increasing intensity against the shore.

As the weeks passed and the days grew hotter, the two women fell into what - to an outside observer - would qualify as a pleasant little domestic routine. Naomi, always up early, would rise before dawn and lace up her running shoes, grab her iPod and a bottle of water, and take a route that would take her precisely 45 minutes and leave her sweating and breathless but strangely invigorated for the rest of her day. Then after a peek in on the always still-sleeping redhead and a cold (very cold) shower, Naomi would barricade herself in her mother's bedroom, the ever increasing boxes of legal research arriving daily and piling up against the bedroom wall.

Emily busied herself with tending the garden, reading the piles of novels and political literature she found on the living room bookshelves (no television here), examining the strange mix of organic and American products in the kitchen cupboards, and spending hours trying on Naomi's old clothes. There was an impressive array of plaid available to her, but she always found herself drawn back to the first thing of Naomi's she had ever worn - the thinning gray law school hoodie, the one that made the redhead almost to feel like Naomi's arms were wrapping her tightly. She slept in it every night.

Emily fell into the habit of leaving cheese sandwiches and half-glasses of beer outside the door every day at what seemed like an appropriate lunchtime, and she would return some hours later to pick up an empty glass and plate. The rest of her quiet hours Emily spent in the garden, laying flat on the grass with her eyes closed and listening to the songs on Naomi's iPod, faithfully stolen away every afternoon from the closet next to the blonde's running shoes and then returned to the same spot every evening. They would sometimes have tea together in the afternoons, on the days when Naomi would feel like she was making progress, which as the trial grew closer seemed to happen ever more infrequently. In the evenings, Naomi would often set her laptop on the kitchen counter and chat with Cook, her bright laughter ringing from the kitchen and making the small woman smile. Emily, however, made a distinct point of avoiding the room like a plague when the video camera was connected, convinced some how if Cook just saw her again he would KNOW. He would know just what happened and then Emily would be alone in the world again.

One particularly frustrating afternoon, Naomi just couldn't stand it anymore. After weeks of preparing the case, she had read every report over and over and weighed every theory - her brain was spinning. There was something, something she was failing to grasp from the jumble of information and she couldn't get past it. Something, something - red perhaps? - was dancing in her brain just beyond her reach and teasing her, making her go insane.

"Fuck it!" she shouted in the empty bedroom, "I need to get out of here."

"Emily!" she shouted up the stairs as she headed out the door, "I'm going running!"

Halfway through her usual route, her shoelace broke and she swore loudly in frustration. "Fuck! Just what I fucking needed!" she shouted to the deserted dirt road, before turning back for home. She dug for the keys in her pocket and unlocked the heavy wooden front door before slamming it in frustration and bounding towards the staircase. Naomi finally looked up, one hand on the railing, as her iPod headphones suddenly started blaring _Sweet Disposition_, and she stood there, mouth agape.

The small woman was standing on the third step from the top, her fingers tenderly stroking a framed photo of a young Naomi sitting on the kitchen counter, mixing bowl in hand. Emily Fitch was completely, utterly naked.

"Jesus! Naomi! FUCK!" the redhead shouted, her dark eyes staring back at the blonde for a long moment with a look of utter shock, before bolting up the stairs and slamming the bedroom door behind her.

"Sorry, sorry, sorry!" The blonde uttered to the now-empty staircase, before slapping herself on one of her flushed cheeks and fleeing to the opposite bedroom, yanking open the door and diving inside. She clicked the lock in desperation.

After Emily had heard the blonde woman shout that she was leaving on a run, she glanced at the clock and knew, from timing Naomi's daily morning routine, that she had precisely 45 minutes to explore the house in solitude. Standing in the bathroom already undressed for a shower, she had instead closed the tap and seized the opportunity to wander through the house, uninterrupted. She made her way first to the kitchen to grab a snack, and made her way slowly through the living room, popping cheddar goldfish in her mouth as she looked. It was a peculiar American snack she had discovered on one of her lengthy inventories of the kitchen cupboards, but Emily found the funny little crackers strangely exotic. Finally taking the time to examine the framed photos on the stairs in daylight, Emily had been lost in her own world until she heard the slam of the heavy front door and was suddenly face-to-face with the shocked-looking blonde woman before she had time to react.

Emily was still panting as she found herself safely back to her room after the encounter on the stairs, and leaned her head back on the door with a thud. Well, that was awkward. The redhead sighed heavily and then smiled to herself with as she remembered the image of Naomi's pupils dilating and turning her bright blue eyes practically black, while her breath caught in her throat as she stared openly for a moment too long. The long and lingering glances the two had shared in recent weeks aside, Emily knew this one - at least - was all about sex. She buried herself under the down duvet and grinned at the ceiling in self-satisfaction.

The next day, Emily busied herself in the kitchen. Sick to death at last of cheese sandwiches, the redhead piled a selection of fresh vegetables from the garden on a cutting board and paused momentarily, turning on the radio. With Temper Trap floating lazily through the house, the small woman turned suddenly to find Naomi had appeared at the door of the kitchen, another panicked expression splashed across her face. Naomi cleared her throat as she lunged for the radio, quickly shutting it off.

"Oh, sorry," Emily said to her frowning, "I thought some music would be okay.."

"No, no problem," the blonde uttered, still obviously still flustered, "just a different song, perhaps.."

The awkward silence in the kitchen was mercifully filled after a long moment with the heavy drum beats of _Crushcrushcrush_, and Emily smirked as she looked over to find Naomi nodding her head along with the beat.

"Aren't you a little old for Paramore?" Emily laughed at the blonde, scrunching up her nose in amusement.

"Aren't you a little aristocratic to even know who they are?" Naomi shot back.

"Not at all," the redhead responded, clearly enjoying herself, "they played for Gerald's niece once - a private show. That Hayley girl is a cutie."

"What?"

"One of the benefits of being around the obscenely rich, I guess. I met her.. we shared hair tips." Emily was giggling uncontrollably now. Naomi clamped her mouth shut and raised an eyebrow. "I'd like to think," the smaller woman continued, clearly enjoying the blonde's discomfort, "that when she shot a video with bright red hair the next week it was in tribute to me."

Emily turned on her heel and strode out of the kitchen as she winked at Naomi, leaving the stunned blonde standing, her mouth once again hanging open wider than ever. _Was she just flirting with me? _Naomi furrowed her brow and chewed on her lip desperately. _I've seen her naked and now she's flirting with me. Jesus Christ. Emily Fitch, an enigma wrapped in a mystery.._

Naomi was pulled from her contemplation of the redhead's naked body by the sharp buzz of her cell phone clattering on the kitchen counter. She dove for it, grabbing fruitlessly at the kitchen counter several times before clamping on to her phone and bringing it to her ear. Cook's distinctive voice pulled her from her daze.

"This has happened before," he said flatly.

"What?"

"Oi, you might want to sit down, Blondie, I gots news forya."

Naomi did as she was told, perching on one of the bar stools and leaning her elbows on the counter. "What are you talking about, Cook?"

"I'm not sure your little girlfriend is as innocent as she seems," he continued.

Naomi ignored the dig as she shot back, "Stop being so fucking cryptic and spit it out you tosser!" She was getting angry.

"It seems her beloved hubby wasn't the only time this girl's been involved in an incident," he explained carefully before adding, "well, if you wanted to call his brutal murder an incident.."

"Huh?" Naomi was momentarily stunned into silence.

"Check your email, love," he said softly, "I think you're in the shit."

Naomi flipped open the laptop in front of her and complied, a sudden sinking feeling pitting low in her stomach at the quiet tone in Cook's voice - something, something was seriously wrong.

She clicked through to Cook's latest message and opened the attached article, the image on her screen filling her with unspeakable dread. She scanned the page quickly with rising nausea and widening eyes as she read all about a girl that had been found dead some ten years ago in the woods outside Bristol. She gasped loudly as Cook's voice rang once again in her ear.

"I think this isn't the first time your girl Ems has killed someone. It seems she splattered the brains of some poor bird named Effy Stonem all over the Bristol countryside with a rock."


	12. Chapter 11 This Has All Happened Before

_A/N – TWO updates for you all today. I felt that one really wasn't complete without the other.._

Chapter 11 - This Has Happened Before

"How? How do you know?!" Naomi gripped her phone violently and shouted back at Cook, her voice echoing off the kitchen walls.

"I was there, all right? I was there that night. Blondie, look.." he answered quickly, no doubt holding the receiver away from his ear.

"What!?" Naomi's face was practically purple, "and you're just thinking of this NOW?!"

"Do you know how many drugs I've taken in my life, Blondie? Literally _thousands_. Really, Naomi, I didn't remember until I saw this news report. Yeah?" his voice rose hopefully at the end. "I swear I didn't know."

Naomi turned again to her laptop, scrolling back to the top of the article on the screen, her chest heaving in panic and her mind racing desperately. The article, the short, colorless article was nothing more than a reprint of a police report about a body found in the woods at Gobbler's End - a teen party had gone horribly wrong, and somehow a girl named Effy Stonem had ended up dead. She had been hit violently over the head with a rock and had bleed out in the woods. The article reported a second girl was found at the location too, a minor, bloodied but uninjured. The article ended abruptly with the news that the police had chalked the incident up to a bad accident - a tumble down an embankment, or a trip in the dark - and no charges ever filed. Naomi calmed herself, gripping her seat with a clenched fist, and spoke with a flat voice.

"But it doesn't list any names, Cook. This could be about anyone.."

"Look at the picture, Naomikins," he replied softly, pausing for a moment to let the blonde woman click through to the attached photo, "that's me. In the crowd. I remember that night."

Naomi's fierce blue eyes zoomed in on the grainy black and white photo, picturing a crowd of disheveled teens watching a lumpy black body bag being hoisted into the back of an ambulance. There, in the center of the image, was the unmistakable figure of a young Cook with his arm slung around an upset looking girl.

"They found a redhead clinging to the dead girl, if I remember it right it was a pretty big mess. She was soaked with that girl's blood and screaming like the devil himself as she was hauled away."

"No charges were ever filed, though Cook? It could have been anything that killed that girl.."

"I'm not nearly as clever as you are, babe, but even I know it ain't easy to fingerprint a rock. Besides, any witnesses - myself unfortunately included - would have been completely soused at the time. Someone killed that girl, we all knew. You would have too, if you had seen it," he sounded almost wistful as he remembered.

Jesus, it was true - or true enough to matter.

Naomi gulped and took several soothing breaths in and out. "Well, there goes my horrible and unfortunate accident theory.." she finally muttered.

"What you on about?" Cook sounded puzzled at her suddenly calm tone, seemingly waiting for the shouting to begin again.

"You do realize I have to defend this person on a murder charge, like, in front of a judge and jury and the like. If you can find this out, so can the Burton family's investigators and so can the prosecution. And there is no way, no FUCKING way, I could keep something like that quiet." Naomi was pacing the floor now, almost talking only to herself.

"Yeah. Shit," was all Cook could manage to reply.

"Emily is already being hounded by the press - could you imagine what would happen if they found out she was involved in something like this a second time?" Naomi scrunched her face up in horror, " I might as fucking well lock her up and throw away the key myself."

"Don't get down on yourself, yeah? You'll figure it out.. and besides, who's to say she wouldn't deserve to be put away?"

"No. Fucking, no Cook! I can't believe she's capable of anything like that - you, you don't know her.." The force in Naomi's voice had returned.

"And you do?" he asked quietly, "don't shout - I'm just being honest. How much do you really know about this girl? For fuck's sake you found her covered in that poor bastard's blood!" Cook was getting animated now, his concern for his friend creeping into his voice, "that's certainly not the beginning of a normal relationship, even for you."

Naomi clamped her mouth shut and considered the truth in his statement. She didn't, she finally admitted to herself, know anything about Emily Fitch other than the redhead seemed to completely strip her of her sound judgment and measured self-control. What the fuck had she gotten herself into? Not just with this case, with her entire fucking life.

The blonde gripped the phone as she stared at the photo once again. She balled her fist and turned to punch the wall as recognition dawned on her.

"Jesus MOTHERFUCKING Christ!" she shouted, slamming her hand into the wall, not even wincing at the stinging pain in her fingers.

"What?" Cook squeaked, "Naomikins what the _ever-living-fuck_ is it now?"

Oh god, Naomi swallowed hard as the familiar features of the girl the young Cook was gripping tightly suddenly became clear. Rounder face, her dark eyes a little hard to see under her uneven fringe, but she was certain she was starting at the unmistakable figure of a young Katie Fitch.

This day had entered into the realms of the unbelievable.

"Your obsession with Katie Fitch didn't start until she got her tits out, did it?" the blonde panned over the phone, her voice tight but steady.

"Obviously, why?"

"Because tell me that it's not you with your arm around Katie Fitch when you're staring at that dead girl," Naomi replied, shifting to cradle the phone between her shoulder and her ear, rubbing the throbbing knuckles of her right hand with the fingers on her left.

She was certain Cook's eyes went wide as she heard his mouth suck in a huge gulp of air as he began to howl in laughter. He didn't stop for a full minute and she finally gripped the phone with her fist again and shouted over him. "Cook! Fucking, _what!?_ Breathe, you tosser, this is a serious fucking problem!"

He coughed harshly and sucked in another ragged lungful of air as he gasped, "she's my mint shag, Naomikins!" He laughed loudly again.

"Are you always thinking about your cock?" she spat back, disgusted.

"No, babes, no! I mean," he coughed again, "my MINT fucking shag, the pussy to whom all other girls are compared.."

She scoffed down the phone, her voice pissed off and confused. She wasn't in the mood for his bullshit this time. "Fuck you! Act for fucking once like something is actually important!" She was shouting again.

"Ah, but it is important, babes," he calmed himself, "you see, I don't remember much about that night, but I do remember having the screw of my life. Everyone since has paled in comparison, and I didn't have anyway to find out who that fucking, like, _goddess_ was. You've fixed me, babe. I should have known no other girls could compare to Katie Fucking Fitch.."

"Great, that's great Cook," she spat bitterly, "I'm so happy your cock has some kind of photographic memory while your head can't even recall enough details to keep me from ruining my fucking life!"

"Calm down, babes, yeah?" he pleaded, "if you say this girl couldn't kill anyone, then she couldn't, yeah? You're, like, clever. You'll fix it."

"Right," she uttered, not even pretending to convince either of them she believed it.

"Just like, talk to her or something, maybe the little Fitch can explain."

She knew he was right.

"But I don't like it, Blondie, and that's just me being honest. Stay safe, yeah?" he said softly, "sleep with a baseball bat under your pillow or something, for my sake.." She snapped the phone closed before he could finish.

She stood alone in the kitchen for a long moment as she stared blankly at the counter tops, her thoughts racing and her stomach twisting in knots at the day's events. This case, her own rash decisions up to now, naked _Emily Fucking Fitch_. Before her brain knew what she was doing, she slid open the glass door separating her from the balmy afternoon outside, and felt her feet carried her across the garden to the sunny spot where she knew the redhead would be sprawled across the grass.

Naomi glared down at the peaceful figure in front of her, observing the tiny smile turning up the corners of her lips as she sunned herself on the lawn, her small hand gripping Naomi's iPod tightly and her closed eyes obviously lost in music.

"Emily! Emily, I need to speak with you!" she shoved the redhead out of her dream state with a rough poke from her foot.

"What?" the smaller woman squeaked as her eyes snapped open in surprise, looking up at Naomi's face and instantly noticing the barely contained rage bubbling underneath the blonde's tight expression.

She pulled the ear buds instantly away from her head and sat up, a feeling of dread suddenly overtaking her. "Look, sorry, if this is about the iPod.." she stammered.

"Effy Stonem."

Naomi saw the horror wash over Emily's face as her eyes opened wide and the color drained completely from her face.

"So it's true then?" the blonde spat at her, "you've already been through this once before."

Emily's eyes searched desperately around in space before dropping them sharply to the fists balled tightly in her lap. _Oh god, oh god, oh god! Naomi knows. _

"How?!" the taller woman was shouting at her now, "how could something like that just HAPPEN to you twice!?

Emily surprised them both as she shot to her feet and scowled with fury, moving dangerously close to Naomi's angry face. "I'm not pathetic, Naomi!" the redhead's voice was husky with tension, "I don't know what you possibly think of me but I'm a real person, too, not some fucking legal experiment!" She took a step closer to the startled blonde, her voice getting quiet again as her dark eyes filled with tears, "Effy Stonem was my girlfriend - well, no - I liked her. We were getting there, and then she died. Satisfied?"

"You're gay?" was all Naomi could mutter after a long silence.

"Gay as a fucking window," Emily bitterly replied, "but that's not really the problem now is it?"

"No, it's not - but, but Gerald.." the blonde sputtered.

"I never fucking slept with Gerald. It wasn't like that. He married me because he was my friend - he wanted to take care of me. He was incredibly kind, actually," Emily cried out, tears now freely flowing down her heartbroken face.

_So much for my she couldn't have possibly done it because she loved him so desperately theory,_ Naomi thought bitterly. Fuck.

"That's why I couldn't go back to Bristol. My parents didn't disown me, but they couldn't ever look at me in the face again. I lost everything that night. My family, my home, the girl I loved.." Emily's voice was breaking now, and the redhead seemed on the verge of cracking into sobs.

"Let me guess, you have no memory of the incident," Naomi said quietly, clenching her fists and staring pointedly at the smaller woman's shaking body. Emily simply shook her head no.

"Bit of a fucked up coincidence, don't you think?" Naomi felt her anger surging again, her own misery squashing any warmth in her voice, "You're lying to me! Jesus, I don't know how I'm going to get us out of this one."

Emily gave her one last desperate look, backpedaling suddenly away from the blonde and a sob wracking her body as she bolted towards the house. Naomi remained rooted in her place, suddenly shivering in the warmth of the summer afternoon as her eyes followed Emily Fitch running away and breaking apart completely.

_A/N - That was a little bone for all those Effily shippers out there - not a connection I personally ever got, but we take all kinds here. Sorry it didn't work out better between them, lol._


	13. Chapter 12 In Too Deep

_A/N - Sorry to all for the brief delay - the actual last episode of Skins has occupied my past few days (I thought it was epic) and now this morning's news that the Skins movie - about Gen 2 for the most part - is actually being written (!!) is making it awfully hard to settle down, but we're back on track regardless. Also, I had this almost finished last night when I got into a long debate with a LJ friend who didn't understand why Emily was so horrible all season and ended up writing her like 10,000 words or something on Emily's motivations and mental state. Ha ha idek.._

This one is for Hyperfitched and everyone else who submitted kind reviews and all the readers who are excited to see how this all plays out. I am too.

Chapter 12 - In Too Deep

Naomi sat in the kitchen in the darkness, staring blankly at the counter top as she had for hours, not even noticing the sun had gone down earlier in the evening in a blaze of red and pink outside the kitchen window. She clenched and unclenched her fists, the pain in her right fist finally bringing her back from her daze. She rubbed her sore knuckles and stood up from her chair.

She had spoken with Cook again earlier, the only thing she could think to do after a desperate search for any news of this Effy Stonem girl and coming up empty.

"Cook," she had said, the stress in her voice apparent to her old friend as she told him what Emily had revealed before she had broken down and run away. Her mind was still reeling.

"If it makes you feel any better, Naomikins, I'm pretty sure I remember that the Stonem bird had flat tits, which is probably why we never got it on. Oh, I have no doubt there was something weird going on with that girl.. I think she had tried to be all fit and mysterious but really just looking mental most of the time."

"Much better, Cook." Naomi hadn't bothered pretending to hide her despair. She had inhaled deeply, running her long fingers through her blonde ponytail as she tried to center herself. Cook waited patiently on the phone for her to speak.

"I suppose if this hasn't come out yet, there is a chance it stays quiet," she had reasoned, "like, you only know because you were there, right?"

"Right, babes, it's gonna be fine."

"Right. Now what to do about Emily.." Naomi had sighed again.

"Where is the little killer now?" She had ignored the dig and responded, "She must be upstairs.. she can't leave without setting off the alarm and attracting every police officer from here to Miami."

"What are you going to do?" he had asked gently.

"I don't know," she had simply said.

Naomi scraped the bar stool away roughly and made her way to the stairs. She stopped at the top, listening intently for a moment to the heavy silence echoing in the house before she turned towards her own bedroom. She stripped off her running shorts and t-shirt and stepped under the scalding blast and simply standing there, two hands on the shower wall as she leaned into the spray and sighed. _This was fucked up._

Emily had sounded so broken when she had run away earlier. Naomi wondered if she hadn't stopped sobbing since their conversation; she didn't know what old and still-bleeding wounds she had opened up in the smaller woman. She sighed. It was nearly midnight when Naomi pulled on a pair of old boxer shorts and a worn t-shirt and found herself standing in front of her childhood bedroom door, hands trembling.

Naomi bit her lip and knocked hesitantly on the door, waiting a few beats until she got no response, pushed it open anyway. She kicked something hard with her bare foot as she made her way inside, cursing under her breath as the sound of a glass bottle rolling across the floor clattered through the silence. She didn't see Emily until her eyes adjusted to the darkness inside and she moved towards the bed. She glanced down, catching the bright white label of what appeared to be an empty vodka bottle that had now come to rest against the bedside table. Recognizing the cheap brand from her teenage years, Naomi realized she must have left it here somewhere, ages ago.

She turned to take in the small form buried under the duvet, the small woman curled in a tiny ball around herself and trying to disappear. Naomi reached a hand trembling hand out and touched her shoulder as she whispered, "Emily?"

The redhead didn't move, didn't look over at her as Naomi pulled the covers back and kneeled beside the small woman on the bed. Emily started shivering as the blonde moved closer and looked up at her at last with wide panicked eyes. Emily was wrapped in Naomi's old Columbia sweatshirt, tear-streaked face looking as empty and shattered as Naomi had ever seen anyone. Naomi's chest tightened painfully at the sight.

"Emily," she said again softly, "Emily, please.."

The redhead finally moved to uncurl herself and prop herself up on her elbows, her huge eyes still locked on the blonde's shining blue ones. She saw kindness reflected back at her and started shaking her head, tears welling up again. Naomi Campbell didn't know what she was doing as she rested her eyes on the shaking woman in front of her. It was like her body wasn't her own, and she just had an inexplicable need to comfort Emily Fitch. Naomi did the only thing she could think to do and leaned over, hands resting on her knees, and kissed Emily tenderly.

The redhead pulled back, looking like she had been burned by Naomi's lips on her own, and stared back at the other woman for a long moment, a thousand emotions flashing across her face in rapid succession.

"Em.." Naomi began to say, before she was shocked into silence by the redhead's sudden movement. Emily's arms wrapped around her neck and fingers threaded into her hair as she was roughly pulled toward the smaller woman as Emily crushed their lips together. Naomi's mind went blank as she was kissed fiercely, the redhead's wet tongue suddenly swirling around her own, a hint of vodka on the smaller woman's lips. Emily kissed her desperately, pulling her impossibly close and breathing her in, clinging to the taller woman as she invaded her mouth and overwhelmed her senses. _Kissing me like she's trying to keep from drowning _was all Naomi could think.

Naomi Campbell was shocked again, if that was even possible, as she found herself roughly flipped over and her head smacked into the pillow as she suddenly found Emily Fitch pinning her hips to the bed with her naked thighs, never breaking the seal of their mouths together. _Jesus she was strong._ The blonde felt hot mouth on her neck, making her groan in spite of her rising panic.

This was wrong.

She started to push herself back up, struggling to free herself from the smaller woman, when suddenly the redhead's husky breath was in her ear. "Don't think," she said hoarsely, the redhead's deep voice sending shivers through Naomi and sending wetness pooling between her thighs. She complied, in spite of herself, as Emily sat back on her hips and stripped off the bulky gray sweatshirt, leaving her completely naked body glowing in the moonlight. Naomi's eyes went wide at the sight of the redhead's hair cascading across her bare shoulders, her perfect breasts, hard nipples and soft thighs bathed in warm blue light and stealing the breath out of Naomi's chest. She knew, she knew how fucked up this was, but she had never seen anything so beautiful.

Emily kissed her again roughly, before pulling the shocked blonde up off the bed and yanking the t-shirt off over her head and shifted her hips to yank off Naomi's shorts, before sliding their naked bodies together as they both moaned at the sudden heat. Naomi found herself kissing Emily back with equal passion, finally in control of her hands again as she gripped the smooth skin of the smaller woman's hips, her fingers almost burning as she touched and caressed the redhead's hot skin.

_Don't think._

Naomi moaned against Emily's hot mouth as the smaller woman shifted off her hips and pressed a strong thigh into the blonde's soaking center and pulled her lips away. Blue eyes went wide as she felt delicate fingers snake between their bodies and slip against her aching clit. The redhead gasped at the wet heat she found there before moving further down and roughly pushing three fingers inside. Naomi's shoulders arched up off the bed and her mouth fell open at the sudden, pleasurable pain before she fell back to the bed and ground her hips against the redhead's hand now fucking her aggressively as she ground her own center against Naomi's thigh.

Her blue eyes went wide as she took in the sight of the redhead, head back and neck exposed, the flush of her skin visible even in the darkness. Emily's eyes, almost black with desire, suddenly locked back on her own and Naomi gasped at the utterly manic gleam in her dark eyes as Emily leaned forward on her free hand, splayed out on the bed next to Naomi's head, and moved her face dangerously closer as she pushed into the blonde with ever increasing force.  
_  
She's out of control_ was the last thought that flashed in Naomi's mind before her eyes rolled back and she finally crashed over the edge with incredible intensity. Then, darkness.

Naomi lay awake in bed staring at the ceiling in the darkness beside the sleeping redhead. _Had she really just fucked a murderer?_ She swallowed audibly and chased the thought away. She had never felt so much passion, she had never been touched like that, but she knew that she was so fucking stupid for letting it happen.

_People that love her have an unusual habit of waking up dead next to Emily Fitch._ Love her? Oh fuck me.

She wondered, now she let herself ponder for a long moment, what it would have been like if she had never been whisked away from Bristol as a child. If they had met each other, known each other - college sweethearts, perhaps? - before all of this had happened. Could Naomi have protected Emily and would the then-undamaged redhead have adored her for it, and they could have somehow lived happily ever after? She shook her head at the ridiculous thought as she eased her way out of her childhood bed, leaving the redhead sleeping deeply - her bright hair cascading against the white sheets - and slipped naked into the hallway.

Now, now she had violated every personal, professional and legal boundary she had ever set for herself she scoffed as she leaned back against the hard wood of her bedroom door, before turning to click the lock. All for Emily _Fucking_ Fitch. Now she was really in too deep.


	14. Chapter 13 Explode

_A/N - And now the shit really hits the fan.. _

Chapter 13 - Explode

One last police report, delivered into Naomi's waiting hands by a private courier the next morning, was all it took for everything in her world to completely unravel.

Naomi sat at the kitchen counter, her laptop glowing as she picked mechanically through the document and desperately tried to keep her thoughts from straying to the still-sleeping woman in her old bed. The final coroner's report - the last piece of the prosecution's evidence against Emily - had arrived rather quickly despite the time Naomi knew it took to conduct all of the necessary tests, catalog photographs, and stamp it with an official seal. She flipped absentmindedly through the pages of the time bomb in front of her with one hand as her damaged fist gripped a steaming mug of tea with the other. The hot liquid seared her throat as she gulped it down, not caring about the pain on her lips as she furrowed her brow and read on.

Gerald Burton's cause of death - no surprise there - was spelled out with cold description and simple illustration on page seven. The poor bastard had been hacked to bits, and bleed out quickly. Naomi said a silent prayer for him as she took in details of how there was blood, not his, mixed in with the puddles soaking into the wood floor underneath him. The killer's perhaps? The whole scene had been too much of a mess for the CSI's to make a positive conclusion. She bit her lip in frustration, sadness, and a sense of foreboding as she read on. She wanted to stop, stop time at this very instant or even a few weeks back, but knew she couldn't.. she never, ever could have this mess under her control again.

It was the smallest detail on page 14 of the thick file that sent her world reeling.

The thing that finally caused Naomi's bright blue eyes to widen in shock, to make her heart practically explode in her chest, was the brief note that sexual activity was present from evidence left on the body. DNA, fucking _indisputable_ DNA was briefly noted as having been found on Gerald's dead body, helpfully recorded in an attempt to recreate his final doomed hours, and the tests concluded that the evidence was a perfect match to the prime suspect - Emily Fitch.

She sat at the kitchen counter, head in her hands as she sunk deeper into despair, for what seemed like hours. She was fucked in every sense of the word, she knew, and she finally was pulled from the light and teasing and pretending of the last few weeks and she just _fucking knew_. Everything was ruined.

She felt the redhead creep into the kitchen even before she heard her, the tiny golden hairs standing up on her arms and the cold shiver she felt running down her spine letting Naomi know that Emily's dark chocolate eyes were staring at her intently. She turned around in her chair, swallowing the sudden lump in her throat, and stared back at her with a piercing blue glare as the smaller woman quickly stopped arm's length away, her unreadable dark eyes searching Naomi's face.

"Hi," the redhead finally said huskily, her small fingers playing with the frayed edge of that_ fucking_ gray hoodie again. Naomi's expression turned dark as her mind reeled, trying desperately to process this new information in a way that didn't leave Emily Fitch with blood on her hands and Naomi Campbell with her heart ripped out of her chest. She failed miserably.

"FUCKING EMILY!" the blonde shouted, surprised at her own strength for a moment, her face twisted in fury.

She ignored the shocked look and open mouth from the smaller woman as she rocketed herself out of her chair. She ran her long fingers through her hair in desperation as she paced the floor. Emily Fitch had played her, and now she was standing on the edge of the abyss. She knew it would only take one small push to break her completely. "You slept with him - what else did you lie to me about!? Did you do it!?" she found herself yelling, her strained voice echoing off the kitchen walls.

The redhead was momentarily stunned into silence, a sense of panic at the other woman's confusing reaction displayed clearly on her normally adorable face. "Wh-what are you talking about?" she finally stuttered.

"Fucking me over literally wasn't enough!" Naomi was shouting at her now. Emily had never seen anyone so angry, and she took a step backward in self-preservation.

Naomi stopped her pacing suddenly and grabbed the offending pages, tossing the relevant section roughly in the redhead's face. The smaller woman grasped for the pages, panic displayed openly in her eyes, as she scanned the report quickly with a look of confusion growing on her terrified face. She looked up at Naomi with a hopeless look. Emily knew at that moment, that heart-stopping and desperate moment, that she was finally and totally fucked.

"Every word, every word out of your mouth has been a lie since the moment we met!" Naomi was shouting again, her fists clenching violently as she stormed the kitchen floor, her fury filling the small space and Emily felt like she was choking on the blonde's anger.

"If you did it - if you fucking killed those people. I'm going to find out if you're lying." Her words were menacing. Emily could only stand there in silence.

"DO you have any idea how much I have on the line for you? It's not just your life anymore!" Naomi moved menacingly toward the cowering redhead, hatred fresh on her lips.

Emily clenched her fists and found herself shouting back, "How!? How did you get me out of there?" Tears were flowing freely down her face now as she faced down the angry blonde in front of her. "This.. all this!" she gestured wildly, "This house, YOU. This can't be normal!"

Naomi was stunned into silence again. She breathed deeply before responding, "I put my life on the line for you, because I believed.." she broke off, not able to finish the rest of the dreaded sentence.

Emily swallowed hard, not even processing the look of despair on the blonde's face as she retorted quickly, "I didn't ask you to. I didn't ask for any of this." The redhead turned away on her heel, preparing to storm out of the increasingly crowded room, before she felt a hand grab her roughly and spin her back around.

Naomi grabbed desperately for Emily, wanting her to explain - to somehow fix it, before she found herself roughly shoved back, the blonde's balance slipping away. She staggered back at the redhead's push and stumbled as she slammed against the kitchen counter, her head snapping forward with impact. Pain exploded in front of her eyes, and once again everything went black.

Naomi came to some time later to the incessant ringing of the rotary phone on the kitchen wall. She groaned, loudly, as her eyes snapped closed again in pain. It was dark already, when had that happened? The blonde winced and touched the back of her head, feeling her bleeding head with cautious fingers as she tried desperately to grasp what was going on. It hit her suddenly.

_Oh god, Emily._

Naomi searched frantically around the room, her head still fuzzy, and the ringing echoing through the kitchen only adding to her rising sense of panic.

Finally, she peeled herself off the tile floor as she sprinted towards the back door, slamming it open, and ran - still swaying on her feet as she desperately moved across the wet grass down towards the water.

She finally spotted Emily, her bright red hair whipping around her tear streaked face as she turned suddenly back at the sound of the blonde shouting her name, her hoarse cries barely audible over the ever growing sound of helicopter blades and wailing sirens.

The redhead stood still for a moment, perched on the very furthest edge of the dock, looking desperately back at Naomi Campbell as they locked eyes and then turned suddenly away as flashing red and blue lights flooded the darkness.

_It was all over._


	15. Chapter 14 Whatever You're Giving

_A/N - Ok, now this is getting fun! Give me cookies or something because I am on a roll. Oh, what's that you say? NEEDS MOAR GINA CAMPBELL!? I live to serve, my lovelies.. _

Chapter 14 - Whatever You're Giving

Naomi Campbell was drunk again. Well, drunk again for the first time in ages, and it felt _fucking_ miserably wonderful. She fiddled with the sharp metal bottle cap in her fingers as she stared blankly, was it one liquor bottle in front of her on the counter top or two? - she couldn't remember. She laughed, really fucking laughed out loud in her silent kitchen to keep herself from crying anymore. The edge of disaster was so close that she wasn't convinced that she hadn't already passed it. But she wasn't going to let herself cry, wasn't going to let herself think about the shambles her life had become in just one short month with the unexpected entrance of one particularly intoxicating redhead. It just didn't matter anymore.

The blonde woman continued playing with the bottle cap, passing it back and forth between her long fingers, as she heard the heavy wooden door slam, but of course she didn't notice enough to react, couldn't bring herself to care.

"I haven't seen you drink straight out of the bottle like that since high school," said the warm, too warm and suddenly soothing figure that invaded her misery and snapped her back to reality.

"Hi Mum," Naomi finally uttered, for once not even attempting to hide the heartbreak in her voice.

Gina Campbell, always a whirl of bright colors and good sense - despite her seeming randomness - dropped her bags at the kitchen doorway and took one long, hard look at her daughter. She was obviously hammered out of her skull and hiding from something again, but Gina didn't hesitate. She sauntered into the kitchen, snatched up the nearly empty liquor bottle from in front of the younger blonde's balled fists and went about fixing it all.

Placing a steaming mug of tea seemingly out of nowhere in front of her distraught daughter, Gina perched herself on the stool opposite and leaned her elbows on the table. "Tell me," was all she said, her blue eyes boring into Naomi's obviously broken face as she set her own cup of tea on the counter in front of her. "She's obviously some kind of client. Why has this girl got you so wrecked?"

And to Gina's complete and utter surprise, Naomi did.

She didn't think she had ever heard her daughter string so many words together - say so much - when she wasn't reciting a legal argument or taking one of their insignificant conflicts way too far - not letting it go until the young blonde was sure she had won. For once in both their lives, Naomi was completely, devastatingly honest with her and Gina's heart ached for her daughter by the end of the story. All of it was confessed - her first perceptions of the redhead, looking up at her with wide, frightened eyes, the great lengths and personal risk she took to free Emily and how out of character is all was, the teasing and flirting and living some kind of strange, happy life together until it all came crashing down and Emily was taken away from her, in a swirl of anger and confusion.

Their mugs of tea, now cold and long-abandoned, seemed an almost insignificant bandage for the situation now, and Gina sighed before speaking the truth once again.

"You're in quite the pickle."

Naomi's tear-filled eyes met the matching blue pair of her mother and she gave a desperate laugh that suddenly turned into a heart-wrenching sob. Gina Campbell, somehow always prepared for the remnants of heartbreak, knew immediately what to do and moved across the counter to embrace her stricken daughter at last. They stayed like that - for a virtual eternity - simply clinging to each other and feeling somehow grounded despite the tempest of emotion swirling around them.

"I think.. I think I love her,' Naomi finally sputtered, her voice tight, before admitting, "I don't know what I'm doing."

"My lovely girl," Gina said, emotion rich in her voice, "you've always been so lonely.. you've never really connected with anyone, my darling, and I've always been so sad for you." She stopped and took a long, loving gaze at her daughter before continuing, "and I love you, baby, I love you so much. But you need something more and for some strange reason it seems like she's it."

Naomi took in a shuddering, almost cleansing breath as she wiped her tears and faced Gina Campbell's open and loving gaze at last. Her mother finally asked, hesitantly, "Do you really think she did it? Killed those two people?"

"No." It was simple, honest, final.

"Then fight for her, darling, you have to fight for her," Gina's response was uttered with a sense of relief, and finality. "You're the only one that poor girl has in the entire world."

Naomi knew her mother's words had never been more true than at that moment. The blonde sniffed once, wiped the tears from her eyes, and took a deep breath in before stepping up and walking swiftly out the heavy wooden door of the house that had once felt like such a sanctuary. Gina Campbell, for all of her floral fabrics and eccentricity, at that moment had a crystal clear vision of her fierce daughter finally picking up her sword and steeling herself to fight.

The next day, back in Miami, back in court, Naomi Campbell somehow managed to keep it all from falling apart.

Somehow, somehow Naomi was able to keep herself out of jail following Emily's meltdown on the dock. Her "you severely overestimate her swimming abilities" line was now responsible for saving her several million dollars worth of forfeit property and complete and utter professional ruin in and disbarment. Thank god the small redhead had only ever strayed some 10 yards outside her relegated zone or Naomi didn't know what would have happened.

She walked out of the courtroom and almost thought, for a brief moment, like luck and maybe even hope could be on her side.

Naomi walked through the dank hallways of one of Miami-Dade's worst facilities once again, ready for anything. She was finally lead into the cold and colorless lockup, altogether familiar, as she sighed and prepared herself for the small woman to appear in front of her and eat through her defenses once again.

She waited, picking nervously at the straps of her briefcase, as the shackled figure of Emily Fitch was roughly brought into the room, her hands small and locked once again to the cold metal table. Emily looked worse, if that was even possible, than the first time Naomi had seen her - cuffed and desperate and curling into herself once again. The blonde took a long look at the smaller and her chest clenched, feeling sad and altogether responsible that the redhead looked even more broken now than in then the last desperate and heartbreaking moments they had shared together.

Finding themselves suddenly alone again, Emily kept her eyes trained on the floor sat in an uncomfortable silence for a long moment under Naomi's intense blue stare. This time, the redhead broke the tension first. "Naomi.. what are you doing?" Emily asked, her deep voice ragged yet somehow still composed.

"I'm still your attorney," the blonde answered back, her deep blue eyes trained on Emily's tense face and this time not leaving the smaller woman for a second. This was it.

"I don't want you to be," was all the redhead could utter, pulling at the shackles on her wrists and shifting in her chair.

"The trial starts tomorrow.. you haven't got anyone else," Naomi's voice was confident now. "If you choose, as is your right, not to let me represent you, the trial will be indefinitely delayed and I can almost guarantee that you won't ever be getting out of here. At least with me you have a shot."

Emily glanced down from her hands to the floor and wouldn't, couldn't look Naomi in the eye. Long moments passed.

"Em, please.." the blonde finally pleaded quietly, her heart breaking and her breath hitching at the sight of the redhead's growing despair. Emily bit her lip finally met Naomi's gaze as she gasped in desperation, "How can you? How can you defend me if you don't even believe it yourself?"

Naomi closed her eyes and took a long, cleansing breath in before she simply stated, "Because I do.. I do believe it. I believe in you. I don't know why, but I've never been so sure of anything in my life." Her bright blue eyes were staring right through Emily now, making the smaller woman shift uncomfortably. She didn't, wouldn't let herself hope.

The taller woman shook her head and reached across the table, again somehow acting without hesitation. "I'm going to fix this, I promise. I'm not going anywhere," Naomi stated, her warm fingers burning into the smaller woman's wrists, cold and painful despite the blonde's warm grasp.

"Why?" the redhead looked up at the other woman again, finding Naomi's intense anger from their previous encounter had completely disappeared and she saw only concern and _love?_ reflected back at her, "Why do you care?"

"I don't have a choice," the blonde simply stated. Emily frowned, still obviously confused, before she quietly answered, "Okay."

"Trust me," Naomi Campbell stood, smoothing down her suit jacket and picking up her briefcase as she said to Emily Fitch with some kind of unreal confidence, "I'll give you everything I have."


	16. Chapter 15 The Trial of Emily Fitch

_A/N - For those of you who are interested, I updated the last chapter and changed a bit at the end - nothing major but I just didn't feel like I had gotten it quite right the first time, you know, since legally Emily really could have told Naomi to fuck off. We're glad she didn't, though._

That said, OK, kiddies, here we are at last! Oh, how is Naomi going to pull this one off? Girl is talented, but even I had my doubts there for a minute.

I just want to say that I was on the jury of an actual murder trial last year and it was the most boring, depressing, and drawn out two weeks of my entire life - I went home and nearly cried every night. SO, that said, boring and depressing is not what I'm aiming for in this chapter, tears of joy for another update maybe, but that is all.

Chapter 15 - The Trial of Emily Fitch

Naomi paced the floor of the courtroom, twisting her silver skull ring, around her finger nervously and watching the gallery slowly fill up with spectators. It was a strange addition to her usually impeccable professional attire, but she knew she needed all the help she could get at this point. _One for luck._

She finally sat down at the defense attorney's table, and arranged her notes and folders in neat lines in front of her, before taking a quick glance over to the thin and balding prosecutor on the opposite side. He smirked back at her, his face cocky. "Wanker," she muttered under her breath, turning back to face the still-empty judge's stand.

"Naomikins!" she heard an excited whisper behind her, and her face suddenly broke into a grin as she recognized the familiar voice. He was here at last.

She turned around, taking in the smiling face of her oldest friend and pulled him into a crushing hug. "Hi, Cook."

He hugged her back for a long moment before pulling away. "Damn, girl, you're fucking fit! I wouldn't have stayed away so long if I knew you grew such a nice pair of tits in the meantime."

"You're taller, you smell better, but you're still the same prick I remember." They grinned at each other stupidly, relief apparent on both their faces. "I'm glad you're here, Cook."

"Glad to be here, too, babes! Thanks for the first class ticket, I shagged a tasty little stewardess on the way over - not bad for my first time out of Bristol," Cook punctuated his story with a waggle of his tongue. Naomi smirked at him, watching him look around and bouncing on his heels excitedly, his hands fidgeting with his awkwardly knotted tie. She was almost certain he had never worn one before. She reached over and smoothed down the knot, adjusted the lapels of his suit jacket and placed a hand tenderly on his face. He smiled back at her, placing his own hand on hers before kissing her palm and sliding into the first seat behind the defense table, separated from the open court by a swinging door and a small wall. She turned back to her seat, already standing as the bailiff called for order and the judge entered the courtroom. Here we go, she thought. _Here we fucking go._

The first two days were taken up by an increasingly dull series of questions answered one at a time by an ever-shrinking pool of prospective jurors. Naomi always hated this part, her usual agitation with the general public only magnified as she worked furiously to pick out those who, for whatever reason, were trying to get on a jury, out of service, or just didn't seem to care either way even on such a sensational case as this. Even the press seemed to be getting bored and agitated as Naomi knew they were producing an ever-increasing series of nasty articles picking apart the life and character of Emily Fitch, accused murderer. The blonde knew, and tried hard to keep her growing agitation in check, that her misery was mostly in response to the fact that Emily wouldn't be present in the court until this part was over. Even though Cook was there, faithfully behind her each day, she longed to have the little redhead beside her so she could find the continued strength to fight this loosing battle.

Twelve acceptable men and women (and three alternates) were finally seated and instructed on their duties midway through the morning on day three, and Naomi sighed deeply in relief.

As Emily was lead into the courtroom for the first time she took a curious look around, and Naomi drank in the image of the redhead like she was starving for her. Dressed in a demure but expertly tailored suit, her red hair was pinned back in a smooth bob and Naomi thought she was stunning, despite the handcuffs. Earlier that week, the blonde had sent a law firm associate to pick out Emily's clothing for trial, with explicit instructions on the type, cut and color of a series of expensive suits, paid for out of Naomi's own pocket. The blonde let herself feel pleased for a moment with the result, before her breath was stolen as she fixed on the simple black framed glasses perched on the redhead's button nose. _Glasses, oh god oh god don't think how sexy she looks in glasses._

Naomi knew better, but at least Emily _looked_ the part of the virginal librarian and Naomi bit back a smirk as Emily was uncuffed and took the seat beside her. The redhead glanced quickly over to Naomi, giving her a small wink before putting her head down and folding her hands in her lap, the quick exchange leaving Naomi's throat dry.

The trial began then in earnest. The prosecutor finished outlining his case by the middle of the afternoon, and looked expectantly over to Naomi, still smirking.

The blonde surprised everyone when she declined to make opening statement, a career first for her. Because really, what was there to say? She admitted to herself that even now she didn't have a solid theory, only her unwavering faith that Emily couldn't have done it. Well, there was one theory in the back of her mind, but regardless, she had absolutely no way to prove it. As the trial wore on, Naomi furiously scribbled notes and stole glances at Emily as the prosecution weaved a tale of the seemingly perfect life of Gerald Burton, the golden prince, until Emily Fitch, cold-blooded murdering psychopath snuffed it out.

_Oh, the things you don't know about her, you wanker_, Naomi thought scowling. But even she didn't know if that was a good thing or bad thing at this point. Mercifully there was no mention of an Effy Stonem, or that this sort of thing had happened before - it was looking awful enough as it was. The entire time, no matter how many times her name was invoked or slandered. Emily kept her eyes on the table and her hands folded demurely in her lap. The only time she looked back at Naomi was the awful moment each day when she was taken back to the lock-up as court adjourned, giving Naomi a long and lingering look as she was lead away, again in chains. She sometimes even managed to give the blonde a small smile as she disappeared, one that was certainly meant to be reassuring but only ever succeeded in making the Naomi feel torn in two. Each time she left Naomi's could literally hear her heart break all over again.

It all went horribly - the prosecution's case was rock solid. Naomi did her best, to bob and weave and land a punch through the evidence now and then, but it was obvious to everyone present that Emily Fitch was going down fast. There were detailed descriptions by witness after witness of Emily's DNA on and under the body, Emily's fingerprints on the knife, Emily found passed out covered in blood next to the body - alone in the hotel room with the door locked from the inside. The details of the crime included huge photographs of Gerald's gaping wounds, suddenly appearing on a chart next to the witness stand and dissected in great detail. Naomi didn't need to look over to Emily to know that her brown eyes were glued to the table in front of her, but the blonde felt her wince.

Emily's escape from custody, her violation of the terms of her release was brought up only once. This time, Naomi winced.

While the evidence was damning enough in and of itself, the motives the prosecution ascribed to Emily's supposed crime made Naomi practically shake with rage. She didn't know how she kept from snapping her pen in two as the prosecutor went on at length one afternoon assassinating Emily's character, sounding just like the tabloids as he called her a whore, a gold-digger, and a scheming sociopath. To Naomi's growing anxiety, he managed to back it up with some pretty damning photographs of Emily looking at Gerald with disgust on her face. The Burton family had come through for the prosecution, it seemed, and though they weren't present Naomi could still feel their influence, their hatred of Emily swirling around her.

Naomi deconstructed and discredited it all as best she could during the day, but at night she had to try desperately to keep from losing hope. Sitting alone in her apartment each night she worked on the case for hours and barely slept, the only time she could ever drift away was when she wrapped herself up in that old gray Columbia Law sweatshirt. She had rescued it away from police custody upon her return to the city, and mercifully it still smelled of Emily. Lying in bed staring at the ceiling, she fiddled with her ring for hours, twirling it around her fingers and trying to think, desperately trying to think. She would remember to eat when Cook would come by with takeout and liven up her apartment with tales of all the series of increasingly alarmingly skanky women he was getting to know at the hotel bar where he was saying.

"Knowing them _carnally_, ya got me Blondie?"

"Yeah, I know." She loved him, but often wished he would leave her to her misery.

All the time, she just missed Emily's familiar presence that she had gotten so used to during their doomed stay at the beach house, particularly when the week ended and the weekend stared her long in the face. A daunting two days alone without any hope of a glimpse of the redhead. She could see her, she supposed, were she to trail through the dungeon and could somehow bear see Emily shoved around and clamped down, but Naomi knew it would just unravel them both even further.

The first day of the second week is when it all finally went wrong, and Naomi furiously tried to keep up. The prosecution had finished their short list of witnesses, crime scene technicians, police officers, even the coroner had made an appearance, but it didn't take long because the evidence was solid and the connections were clear. The prosecutor, _that wanker_, had been close to resting his case, she thought, when he spoke up to the judge and all the color drained from Naomi's face.

"The prosecution has one last witness, your Honor, the People call Katie Fitch."

Naomi was on her feet in a second, slamming her palms on the table in front of her and practically shrieking "OBJECTION!" before she took a breath and almost automatically recited, "this witness is not on the list, this witness hasn't been made available to us, this witness has nothing to add to the prosecution's case!" This witness was _Katie Fucking Fitch._

"Step forward" said the judge, peering down from her stand and raising an eyebrow at Naomi's furious eyes staring daggers into the smug-looking prosecutor. "Explain." This was directed at the prosecutor.

"Miss Fitch has only been recently located. She was out of the country until recently - she's a citizen of the United Kingdom after all - and we were having difficulty contacting her. She's here now," he said, smirking back at Naomi's tense face with a happy gleam in his eye. "Fair enough, I'll allow it. I'm_ allowing_ it Miss Campbell," she put a hand up as Naomi opened her mouth to argue further. She bit her lips, scowling, and walked back to her table, not meeting Emily's eyes staring up at her in question and giving Cook a desperate gaze instead. He shrugged.

The courtroom door opened, as the room feel silent and all eyes turned to watch Katie Fitch saunter into the room. Naomi knew at last that they were all _royally fucked._

_A/N - The Trial of Emily Fitch Part 2 should be up by tonight! Oh, now it's getting interesting.._


	17. Chapter 16 The Trial of Emily Fitch Pt 2

_A/N - Naomi may not like Katie Fitch, but I simply adore her. Here comes trouble. xD_

Chapter 16 - The Trial of Emily Fitch Part 2 - Enter Katie Fitch

Naomi stared openly at the elder twin as she picked her way daintily to the front of the courtroom and carefully perched herself on the witness stand. _It's like she's stalking me,_ Naomi thought to herself bitterly, _Katie Fitch is fucking everywhere._

All eyes were on the small woman as she placed her handbag in her lap and folded her fingers gently across her lap. Gone was her violently purple hair, now toned down to a respectable auburn, and rather than an alarming variety of animal print she was dressed in a light pink suit, a single strand of pearls clasped around her neck, and the lightest dusting of rose blush on her cheeks.

_That sneaky fucking bitch! _Naomi's eyes darkened and she tried desperately to keep the rage from etching across her features, feeling the judge suddenly staring in her direction and raising an eyebrow at the blonde woman's clenched fists.

Naomi forced herself to sit down and exchanged a tight-lipped glance over at Emily, her eyes wide and her mouth hanging open as she took in the sudden appearance of her twin and her complete and utter transformation into something out of a mother-of-the-bride magazine. She turned around and looked back at Cook, his lips pursed together and his large hands bouncing on his knees as he took in Katie Fitch, in the flesh, for the second time in his life. He was visibly sweating and looked as though he was in desperate need of a cigarette. She turned back to the table and picked up her pen. _Perfect, just perfect._

Katie on the stand as prosecution witness was a marvel to behold, if it wasn't so unspeakably horrible for Emily's chances of ever seeing daylight again. Naomi watched character assassination take twin form she knew she hadn't ever seen anything quite like it. It was quietly, magically brutal.

The prosecutor lead Katie through a carefully choreographed series of questions and answers, each and every one placed perfectly to make it clear to the jury that Katie Fitch was heartbroken, _just heartbroken_ that things had come to this, but that she just couldn't live with herself if she didn't help get justice for her sweet and darling brother-in-law, a gem of a human being, adored by all, including most of all by the elder twin. She just couldn't believe Emily had done such a terrible thing to that wonderful man, but finally had to accept the sad truth. She played the part to utter perfection.

"Now, Katie, you've got a bit of a wild reputation yourself, don't you?" the prosecutor asked gently.

"Yes, I admit, I had a bit of a problem when I was younger," she answered sweetly, "I did some things I wasn't proud of, I've got all that sorted now and I'm just hoping to dedicate my life to serving others. The Katie Fitch Foundation, where I put most of my efforts, is mainly a child welfare and social justice organization."

Naomi's eyes narrowed at the web of lies. Katie Fitch was the most fantastic little actress, and the blonde knew she was winning this round by a mile. Emily continued to stare at her sister, who never once returned her gaze, her face tight and her fingers gripping the table and turning white.

"That's lovely, Katie. Thank you for coming all this way."

"No problem, at all, I just want to see justice done," Katie flashed a sweet smile and a little wink to the jury box. They all adored her, Naomi could tell. She sighed.

Finally, it was her turn to interrogate, and she stood, smoothing her suit jacket and composing herself for a beat, before walking to the front of the courtroom. She passed the prosecutor on his way back to his table and he shot her a cocky little smirk and a tilt of his head. The look of pure and unadulterated hatred Naomi shot back at him said _go ahead, smirk at me again, I fucking dare you_, and she saw him wince visibly. _One small victory today, at least_, she thought before she turned to the elder twin, a dangerous tension already crackling between them as innocent chocolate eyes peered at her through dark lashes and she tilted her head ever-so-slightly to the side.

Naomi took a deep breath in, squaring her shoulders, and asked simply, "Did you always hate your sister or is this more of a recent development?"

"What?" Katie was clearly taken aback by the question, but only for a moment, before countering quickly, "I love my sister. I love her so very much, but I don't know why she's done such terrible things.."

"Emily Fitch has done terrible things?" the blonde tried again.

"Looks that way, doesn't it? Oh, Emily, _why?_" she finally threw a pleading look in her twin's direction, but Naomi could see it was over Emily's head, not down to her eyes.

"But you have had a _troubled_, shall we say, relationship with your sister long before Gerald Burton was murdered, isn't that right?" Naomi grasped at straws, hoping she was winning points with the jury. Somehow, she doubted it.

The elder twin smirked back at Naomi with her eyes, the slightest curl reaching her lips, unnoticed by anyone but the blonde. _Oh, shit._

At that moment, Katie Fitch broke down on the stand and went in for the final, killing blow on her redheaded sister. "I don't hate her, I'm scared of her.." she wailed, dabbing her huge brown eyes with an embroidered handkerchief that the blonde was certain had appeared out of nowhere, "..ev-ever since she killed my very best friend at a party in Bristol when we were teenagers.."

Katie looked back at Naomi with thinly-veiled satisfaction as she continued, "..she killed my friend Effy Stonem with a rock, she bashed her head in and then rolled around in her blood."

There were gasps suddenly peppered throughout the otherwise stone-silent courtroom, and Naomi objected, her voice stuttering in panic.

"You opened the door, Miss Campbell, I'll allow it." The judge said forcefully.  
_  
Fuck. FUCK!_

Katie continued as though there had been no interruption, "There is something seriously wrong with that girl.. she's like, a psycho or something.." She kept going but Naomi wasn't listening anymore. The blonde was spinning, her hopeless and panicked eyes wouldn't meet Emily's desperate gaze. This was it.

"Naomi!" A voice suddenly cut through her reeling mind and she turned to see Cook waving for her attention. The blonde managed to utter, "One moment please!" in the judge's general direction as she rushed back to the seat where she saw Cook's eyes light up as he leaned over to her with a crime scene photo gripped in his fist. Naomi took one lingering look on the picture, a close up shot of Gerald's naked torso that the blonde was sure she had stared at a thousand times before, and then it all clicked. Like she was seeing it for the first time, she trained her deep blue eyes on the tattoo etched across his ribs. It hit her all at once - although now partially covered with large script spelling "Emily" that distinct red circle was still visible, although mostly obscured with black. Naomi gasped, felt a surge of energy as relief crash over her like a wave. _Now I can prove it. _

The blonde turned back to the front of the courtroom, staring back at Katie Fitch's face, which was wavering between looking amused and slightly bored at Naomi's antics. "What was your relationship to Gerald?"

"Ugh. What?" Katie scrunched up her face in confusion.

"Isn't it true," Naomi said, confidence settling back into her voice as she looked back at Cook, who was already clicking desperately on Naomi's laptop, "that you had a sexual relationship?" She looked back at the elder twin pointedly.

"What? No!"

Cook dashed forward and handed her the computer as she locked eyes with him, projecting her gratitude for a beat as she turned around and plugged the computer into the large monitor already sitting beside the witness stand, left conveniently facing the jury box after a particularly gruesome walk through of the crime scene presented by the prosecution the previous week. _Time to slay the dragon._

Suddenly, the silent courtroom was filled with the sounds and images of Katie Fitch being fucked roughly from behind by Gerald Burton, as Naomi froze the frame after a long moment and held up the crime scene photo in her hand. She pointed to the tattoo and showed it to the jury, then turned on her heel back to the witness box, she staring down the elder twin with a devastating blue gaze. She knew she didn't even need to explain.

Katie Fitch looked startled, then shocked, and finally her face twisted in anger. "I hated it - she wasn't any good for him! My loser sister only brought him down!"

Naomi glanced back at Emily, expecting her to look broken at her twin's betrayal, but instead the redhead stared down her sister, her fists balled and her face practically purple with rage. The blonde turned back to Katie, the smaller woman sputtering and twisting on the witness stand. "But he didn't want you anymore, did he?"

"That _fucking_ political career, his _fucking_ family. He said it was over, but nobody, _nobody_ dumps Katie Fucking Fitch!" the twin spat back at her violently.  
_  
I've got you now, you miserable cow,_ Naomi thought with satisfaction as she could see the elder twin visibly crack in front of her. "But he did, and so you killed him."

Katie was angry now, was shouting, didn't care that the jury was staring back at her with horrified expressions. "He actually started to love my sister. Nobody _fucking_ loves her!"

Naomi leaned in closely smirking back at her and whispering quietly, a dangerous edge to her voice, so that only Katie could hear. "I do," she said simply, "and now you're finished."

Before she could react, Katie grabbed the back of Naomi's head and slammed it down, a sickening crack filling the silent courtroom as the blonde's head bounced off the edge of the witness stand and she stumbled backwards, falling flat on the floor. She moaned as she slumped against the cold tiles, her forehead bleeding and her brain fuzzy.

When she opened her eyes again a moment later, the entire courtroom had descended into complete chaos, people shouting and running about punctuated with the desperate slam of the judge's gavel as she screamed for order. It continued to riot unabated.

Naomi pushed herself up on her elbows and looked over through her hazy vision as Emily Fitch literally jumped over the table and launched herself at the fleeing form of her sister, tackling her twin and sending them both sliding across the tile floor. They crashed into the judge's stand in a fury of arms and legs as they struggled fiercely for a moment, before Emily somehow gained control and shoved her sister roughly to the floor, straddling her. The redhead looked down furiously for a moment before she pulled her arm back and cracked her sister straight in the jaw and then again in the side of the head, the deafening thuds audible even in the noisy courtroom. Naomi raised an eyebrow as she watched the blurry vision of the redhead as she continued to pummel her twin with unbridled fury until two deputies rushed in and pulled the two women, still flailing and screaming, apart from each other and hauled them out of the courtroom.

Naomi blinked once, then glanced over at the concerned face of Cook, now kneeling beside her, as he touched her bloodied forehead with panic in his eyes. Naomi grasped his hand roughly, pulling herself close to his open arms, before she threw her head back and howled in laughter, not stopping for a full minute. 

X

X

_A/N - Of course Katie did it! I know that's been pretty obvious for a while, and was actually the initial concept for the story, but the thing was in the details, yeah?. We can all be sure that Naomi knew it all along too - she just couldn't prove it in court. I'm thinking her earlier anger at Emily over the DNA was more to do with the fact that she might have slept with Gerald than that she might killed him, so she kinda went crazy for a second. But that's our Naoms for you - thinks with her pants when it comes to our favorite redhead. And no, this isn't quite the end just yet._

The Trial of Emily Fitch - good times for everyone (except Naomi, she kind of had a rough day)

Thanks for reading!


	18. Chapter 17 Ours

_A/N - Ok, so.. my girlfriend accidentally took my car keys to work with her this morning, so I was stuck at home until noon. Bad for me, but lucky for all of you because it gave me the chance to bang out most of another update! Woo! The lovely Hyperfitched - once again this bit is for you, with my eternal gratitude. Hope you enjoy._

This chapter is a happy change of pace. And to her great relief, Naomi does not get bashed in the head by one of the twins.

Chapter 16 - Ours

"You know you really shouldn't have done that. Do you know how much extra paperwork that made for me?" Naomi folded her arms and watched Emily walk out of the door of the Miami-Dade Women's Prison facility once again. "We could have just walked out of the courtroom yesterday if I hadn't had to sort all of this out about you attacking a prosecution witness."

They were alone in the dusky parking garage, Naomi knew the press was swarming the front gate as usual. Emily walked over toward the blonde, who was leaning casually against her blue BMW, the top already down. The redhead smoothed her rumpled suit and rubbed her bruised knuckles, before matching the taller woman's amused smirk with one of her own, "It was worth it."

Emily bit her lip in concentration and then looked up into Naomi's deep blue eyes, regarding her seriously, "She hurt you."

The blonde stared back at her for a beat, then smiled. "Thank you for avenging my honor. And here I thought I was the vanquishing hero in this relationship.."

They both let the word hang in the air for a long moment, and then the redhead broke into a small grin, "And how is your brilliant head?"

Naomi sighed, "I'll live. But please tell me you're not actually triplets, because, _Em_, I really think I might lose serious IQ points if it happens again." Naomi raised an eyebrow with her usual flourish, and then winced at the twinge of pain in her forehead, "As it is, I think I may have a dent in my brain."

The redhead blushed visibly for a quick second, and then opened her mouth and laughed deeply, the sparking sound pure music to Naomi's ears. "I knew that already," she teased.

The charges had been dropped, the People's once air-tight case against Emily Fitch had blown apart in appropriately spectacular fashion. The judge had officially dismissed the case due to witness misconduct, _that was putting it lightly_, but Naomi knew they also now had reasonable doubt, in spades. The charges wouldn't be refilled, Naomi made fucking sure they wouldn't be refilled later in the judge's chambers, staring over at the flustered prosecutor with a piercing look that said, _I will hunt you down and rip your tiny balls off, you unbelievable wanker_. The wiry man had gulped and refused to meet her gaze, and the blonde had smiled victoriously.

Sitting later in the court's first aid office, a fussy paramedic cleaning her up and pasting a single tiny steri-strip to the cut on her forehead, Naomi thanked her lucky stars that James Cook was such a fucking pervert. That he had watched the Katie Fitch sex tape untold _thousands_ of times and knew every disgusting pixel by heart. That he had been fidgeting so much in his seat in the courtroom at the sight of the elder twin that Naomi had shoved one of her case files back in his hands to keep the loud drumming of his fingers from driving her insane, and that he had been nervously flipping through the gruesome photographs as he couldn't bear to watch his oldest friend eaten alive in the courtroom. It was some kind of unreal fortune, the blonde pondered, they had gotten so close again, spoken so much over the last weeks that Cook knew, just knew she would find that missing piece of the puzzle seconds after he did. To his great credit and Naomi's eternal gratitude, he instinctively acted after alerting her to the photo, pulling up the offending tape and placing it in her waiting hands.

It seemed so unlikely that they were here at all, together at this very moment.

"We really need to stop meeting like this," Naomi said at last, moving to open the car door, "please do your best to stay out of prison from now on, because I just hate this place."

Emily stayed rooted in her spot as she brought her deep chocolate eyes up to Naomi's smiling face, staring for a long moment square in her sparkling blue eyes before pushing her back against the car door and kissing her fiercely. The redhead wrapped her arms tightly around the taller woman's body and pulled her impossibly close, moaning into the blonde's hot mouth as she found her tongue and drank her in. Naomi broke the kiss after a virtual eternity, both of them panting with exertion as they held each other for a long beat, and then another.

"That's not going to cut it," Naomi said, scrunching up her nose at the redhead and peering down at her seriously.

"What?" the redhead instinctively brought one hand to her lips and looked at the blonde with started eyes.

"All these weeks of my legal services costs a lot more than one kiss, even from you.."

She kissed Emily again.

"..even though you're very good at it.."

And again.

"..these are expensive fingers.."

The redhead scowled playfully as she eyed the blonde woman smirking back at her, "Are you ever going to stop being such a sarcastic bitch all the time, Naomi?"

"Probably not," she answered, smiling over at Emily. She had missed this, had desperately missed their teasing. Her face turned serious after a moment of getting lost in the redhead's amused expression, "The thing is, Emily, you can pay me with actual money now, too."

"What?" the smaller woman was confused.

"Gerald's will - it's in my case files," Naomi continued, " he left you everything. And now that you are no longer accused of killing him, it seems you are now worth more than the GDP's of several of our world's most moderately prosperous nations!"

Emily looked back on her in shock. "What?" was all she could manage again.

"And.. you are now the title holder to a large flat in London, an exotic villa in Spain, some commercial property in Tokyo," Naomi took a long breath, "and oddly enough, a small yellow house in Bristol."

The redhead blinked once, absorbing this new information with an unreadable expression settling on her perfect features.

"So, what are you doing to do now that you're obscenely rich and free as a bird?" Naomi asked, trying to keep the tiniest hint of anxiety out of her voice. She waited a long moment, staring hopefully at the redhead.

Emily smiled back at her sweetly, before dropping her dark brown eyes to take in the blonde's long body before turning her head back up and gazing through her eyelashes with what could only be described as a completely filthy look. Naomi swallowed audibly and turned bright pink.

Emily laughed at the effect she had on the now-flustered other woman and grabbed her hand, "Come on, _Naoms_, let's go home."

As they drove through the busy streets of downtown Miami, Naomi grinned widely as she glanced over at the passenger seat, her shining blue eyes watching Emily find herself part of the world again after so long as the redhead smiled happily and played with the warm wind with her small fingers. _Maybe part of the world for the first time,_ Naomi thought contentedly. The breeze whipped through both their hair as Naomi reached over and entwined their fingers. Emily looked back at her with sunlight dancing in her eyes and gently squeezed the other woman's hand as they drove on.

As they arrived at last back at Naomi's apartment building, the blonde found herself pinned to the sides of the private elevator - mercifully empty - thudding against the wall of the long hallway, and finally crashing up against the door of her apartment, held there for a long moment by searing kisses from Emily Fitch. She finally had to push the redhead's eager lips away to concentrate on unlocking the door, her hands fumbling, and the blonde slammed the door closed somehow before she found herself tossed roughly to the floor this time, landing with a crash. _That bitchy woman in 14-B be damned_, Naomi thought, as Emily straddled her and ripped open her dress shirt, buttons popping everywhere, before the smaller woman suddenly pulled away and yanked her toward the bedroom.

Naomi sank back into her dark purple sheets, now completely stripped of her tattered clothes, and watched through lust filled dark eyes as Emily slowly removed the rest of her crumpled suit and stood in front of her, completely naked. The blonde thought Emily Fitch looked even more beautiful in the waning sunlight shining into the apartment just then, than even she had bathed in deep blue moonlight all those weeks ago.

Naomi's breath was stolen from her chest as the redhead moved slowly up her body, not yet touching, _not yet mine_, until Emily pressed one strong thigh against her aching center and Naomi almost came undone. The blonde's eager fingers gripped the redhead's hips, pulling her closer reaching up for one more taste of the smaller woman's mouth, tongues swirling, and she trailed her long fingers down Emily's body and dipped at last into her soaking center. She was startled from her haze momentarily as she felt the redhead grip her wrist and suddenly stop her hand. "Wait," she said softly.

"What is it?" Naomi's blue eyes opened widely to see Emily staring back at her, intently, searching for something in the blonde's face open face.

"You love me?" the redhead finally whispered, a slight waver in her voice.

"I do," the blonde said without any hesitation.

"Say it again."

"I love you," Naomi said, with even more force this time, and Emily crashed her lips into the blonde again, the frantic passion of her desire even stronger than before as the redhead pushed Naomi's eager fingers deep inside her, slippery with heat. They both groaned at the contact, and started moving together in perfect rhythm.

_I love you I love you.._ Naomi whispered over and over into the redhead's searing kisses as they both fell completely into each other, and crashed over the edge.

Later, Naomi propped herself up on her elbows, careful not to lose any crumbs from her cheese sandwich down her bare torso or into the bed sheets, as she watched the redhead wander around her bedroom, completely naked. Emily's nimble fingers were picking up, turning over, and examining everything in sight, her eager chocolate eyes taking in all the little physical remnants of Naomi that made up her world. The blonde stared at her, feeling lucky that her new _girlfriend?_ had such an interesting choice of pastimes. Naomi smirked, _it could have been so much worse than an overwhelming need to explore her surroundings in the buff._

"What did you mean when you said that nobody ever loved you?" the blonde finally asked, food forgotten as she focused on Emily once again. "Earlier, you know, when we were actually talking between, _erm_, other activities." The blonde felt herself blushing at the series of sizzling memories, trying desperately to keep the flush from creeping up her face again.

Emily stopped, putting down the heavy legal text she had been absentmindedly flipping through, and turned back to face the other woman.

"I meant my family, my friends. They all loved Katie, not me," she said wistfully, "Nobody ever really even saw me until you did."

Emily came back to the warm bed and snuggled into the blonde's open arms. They stayed like that for a moment, the redhead running her small fingers over the other woman's increasingly flushed skin and drawing lazy patterns, smiling at the knowledge that she was leaving a trail of goose bumps wherever she touched.

"Gerald loved you," Naomi finally said, "I'm sure he did."

"Gerald was a flawed person, and I know he got just as much out of our arrangement as I did," Emily explained, "I played the public wife, and he could continue to act like a lad in private all the same. It was win-win."

The redhead looked back into Naomi's slightly concerned expression before adding, "He was lovely in some ways, he _was_, but then he got himself mixed up with Katie. I would have warned him, if I had known.." she trailed off.

"He was a big boy, he knew what he was doing," Naomi responded before smiling over at Emily and raising her eyebrows suggestively, "I know from experience, mess with an angry Fitch and those _fierce_ flames will burn you."

"And what does that say about you?" the smaller woman shot back, eyes wide with amusement, before Naomi suddenly grabbed her up, moved her onto her lap, and started kissing her desperately.

"I, for one, absolutely know I'm living dangerously," she whispered into Emily's heated lips, "and I just want it all to consume me."

As they faced each other sometime later under deep purple sheets, the sun peeked through the blinds, and Naomi was certain she had forgotten what day it was - didn't care - as she rubbed her long fingers over the perfect curve of the redhead's naked hip and back up her side. "I'm quitting the firm," she said into the comfortable silence.

"Why?" the redhead asked softly, her fingers toying with an errant strand of the blonde's wavy hair.

"I got what I wanted, and it's time to make a change. Time to travel. Time to do.. _that_ again.." Naomi raised herself up on one elbow and stared adoringly at the redhead, placing a gentle hand on her flushed cheek. "I'm not letting you go, Em, never again."

The smaller woman leaned into the blonde's warm palm and answered simply, "I'm not letting you go either, Naoms." They both smiled happily at each other for a long moment.

"What is all this then," Naomi asked at last, "this life?"

Emily leaned over to close the space between them and kissed her deeply again, "I think it's ours."

The redhead rolled over and stared at the ceiling contentedly for a beat, before furrowing her brow and turning to Naomi again. One last thing was eating at her. "I still have questions," Emily confessed, "I want to know why. Why don't I remember what happened?"

_A/N - Nope, we're not done yet. You didn't think I forgot about Katie Fucking Fitch did you? It seems there are still some pieces of the mystery to unravel. Thanks, as always for reading._


	19. Chapter 18 Mine

_A/N - Sorry for the brief delay, got chewing on a bunch of other things this week and kinda ran out of words. I only have so many! But here we are, in which Emily goes a bit mental and our second favorite twin returns. All our questions will be answered at last. Enjoy!  
_  
Chapter 18 - Mine

The next few weeks only proved that Emily Fitch was the most bizarre little person she had ever met and Naomi Campbell somehow found herself falling deeper in love every day as she desperately tried to keep up. The redhead's appetite for life and for all things Naomi was absolutely insatiable. The blonde's throat was sore from laughing so hard, her face was sore from constantly grinning, and the rest of her body was sore from.. a host of other frequent and highly inappropriate things.

For the first seven days, every time Naomi attempted to dress and sneak out of the apartment, Emily would seek her out and destroy her clothes once again. Naomi silently tabulated the ever-growing cost of replacing what had been an expansive and incredibly expensive wardrobe of designer suits, but really, she didn't mind. _Fuck it, I'm not ever going to wear this shit again anyway._

Early one morning, Naomi woke with a start to find the tangled purple sheets beside her cold to the touch and no trace of the redhead anywhere in her apartment. As she searched frantically throughout the series of rooms - looking desperately and not finding Emily anywhere - Naomi wished for a brief and horrible moment that the smaller woman had the ankle monitor again, at least then she would know Emily hadn't just disappeared. She stood in the semi-dark kitchen and ran her hands through her blonde locks in frustration before a low and almost whispered _"Hi"_ snapped her head around the room and then up, finally spotting the redhead perched cross-legged on top of the freezer, peering down at her with amusement dancing in her dark brown eyes and her lips gently caressing a bright red popsicle. _Who does that?_

"What on earth are you doing?" Naomi was clearly flustered as she stared back at Emily, relief and confusion washing over her in equal measure.

"Breakfast," the smaller woman giggled, "it was for you, but I got hungry."

"Jesus, Emily, it's five AM!"

Naomi was silenced as she found herself flat on the kitchen floor, having been dive-bombed from above by a swirl of red hair and flying limbs as she was pinned to the hard tiles. She moaned as she felt cold lips and a hot tongue attacking her neck. "Breakfast, right," Naomi muttered into the redhead's searing kiss, her senses overwhelmed with the taste of cherry and.. red, before she felt icy fingers pushing inside of her, making her thrust her hips back involuntarily and suddenly see stars.

Finally, finally making it out of her apartment intact mid-day the following Tuesday, Naomi pulled out the chair from the table of the sidewalk cafe and sat down to face her former supervisor. His fat, balding face was already glistening in the heat of the afternoon sun, the umbrella above them doing little to break the intense mugginess of the summer's day in Miami.

"I'm quitting the law firm, there isn't anything you can do to change my mind," she said simply. The fat man shrugged, his tailored suit bunching up against his shoulders as he ran his pudgy fingers along the menu and looked back at her with regret. "Well then, enjoy one last meal with me and tell me all about what you're going to do next." Naomi picked up her own menu, knowing she was in store for one long and boring lunch, and sighed, but she knew she owed him that much for letting her take on the case against Emily. "I don't know what I'm going to do next," the blonde had finally responded with uncharacteristic candor, "for once it's all just a mystery to me."

When Naomi had returned home later in the afternoon, storm clouds had rolled in and Emily had dragged her, still dressed in her business attire, to the roof of the building where she shoved the blonde down into a lawn chair and straddled her body. She stripped off her t-shirt, wearing absolutely nothing underneath, undressing with slow and deliberate movements as the other woman stared at her, open-mouthed and with lust suddenly darkening her bright blue eyes. She reached out to touch the naked redhead, now grinding against her hips desperately, as rain drops started to fall and splashed around them, bouncing off the redhead's bare skin and sizzling on the hot pavement. Naomi kissed her, deeply, longingly, and ran her long fingers down the smaller woman's body and dipped into her heated center. _She's wet, oh, she's always so wet for me,_ she thought as Emily moaned into her mouth at the slightest touch. They stayed like that for hours, fucking in the hot rain and rising steam of the late afternoon as the busy city swirled around them below the rooftop.

The following Thursday they had managed to keep their eager hands off of each other long enough to both leave the apartment and make it to the bank. Emily sat beside Naomi and played with her fingers between shooting the blonde filthy looks as the taller woman tried to ignore her and keep the blush that was creeping up her neck from reaching the tips of her ears. The details of Gerald Burton's estate were spread out in front of them on the heavy wooden desk, and Emily Fitch now had enough zeros tacked on to the end of her bank account balance that even Naomi's eyes went wide at the amount. _Jesus_. The redhead shrugged as if she didn't care, and rubbed her foot up the blonde's bare leg suggestively, looking over at Naomi through lidded eyes, her desire etched plainly across her face. She winked, and the blonde woman gulped.

Emily insisted on traveling back to the beach house to collect several favorites of the blonde woman's old plaid shirts, ignoring Naomi's repeated protests that she could simply buy an entire new wardrobe, or several city blocks of clothing stores if she so desired. The redhead was persistent, and soon found herself wrapped up in another colorful hug from Gina Campbell as the three women stood together in the sunlit kitchen. Gina once again looked at her daughter over the redhead's shoulder and mouthed _What is she wearing?_ as Naomi raised an eyebrow and looked down - Emily was barely clothed in her favorite tiny shorts and a ratty t-shirt of hers with the faded image of a pig on the front. The younger blonde woman simply shrugged, before surprising all three of them by suddenly joining in and wrapping her arms around the other two, squeezing them both tightly. They stayed like that for a long moment.

Emily sat on the very furthest edge of the old wooden dock, her toes splashing in the water and a happy smile on her face as she spent the afternoon polishing off an entire bag of little orange goldfish crackers. Naomi, turning from her spot beside her, looked over at the redhead's obvious delight with an amused expression. "That makes me wanna puke," Naomi teased, and Emily hit her in the face with a cracker. They both laughed and Naomi wrapped an arm tightly around Emily and pulled her close as they stared back out over the sparkling blue water together.

Naomi hadn't seen Cook since the night after the trial had blown up with his assistance. She wasn't worried, knew he was probably just enjoying the numerous tasty delights Miami had to offer. _Carnally_. She had given him enough money in thanks for his services and quick thinking that she thought it really didn't matter - he would find his way back to Bristol somehow.

Finally, Naomi succeeded in getting Emily to agree to go jeans shopping, the little white shorts having somehow been misplaced behind the radiator in her apartment. They were nearly caught by an angry security guard when the redhead had jumped Naomi in the changing room and shoved her small hand down the front of Naomi's jeans, making her blue eyes go wide in shock. "I thought I told you at least try to stay out of jail!" Naomi had scolded her, as they had escaped out the front door of the shop, mercifully undetected.

Emily insisted that she wanted to learn to drive one morning, sitting in the driver's seat of Naomi's blue BMW and refusing to hand the blonde woman her keys until Naomi finally snatched them back as she distracted the smaller woman with a heated kiss. The taller woman had some unreal feeling that that, more than anything, Emily on wheels was just not a good idea. _Perhaps another time._

As they strolled through the busy sidewalks one afternoon, hand in hand, Naomi had to physically restrain Emily from running down the street and nearly punching a photographer, who turned out to simply be a startled tourist just trying to capture his young family in front of a fountain. "Stay OUT of jail, please!" Naomi was getting exasperated. _It must be like having a kid, all this chasing after someone, _she thought. _Hmm.. kids,_ she pondered for a quick second._ No, no, no_ and the blonde had gulped, her mouth suddenly dry at the horrifying thought. _Maybe a dog. Or maybe start with a goldfish, _although she wasn't entirely certain the redhead wouldn't swallow that too.

At the end of the second frantic week, Naomi looked over, somehow finding herself on the floor in a tangle of purple sheets, as Emily played with her fingers and peered down with an amused expression from the edge of the bed.

"It's not all over after tomorrow," the blonde had said seriously, "all this, it doesn't have to end." She propped herself up on her elbows and took in the redhead's sudden frown as she continued, "you don't have to fit it all in a whole life's worth of memories into this moment. Just because we're seeing Katie tomorrow."

Emily rolled over on her back and stared at the ceiling. "We'll see," was all she said, her deep voice barely a whisper.

X

Katie Fitch sat across the plain metal table from the two women and smirked, the defiant look on her face once again causing Naomi to frown. The elder twin, Naomi thought, somehow even managed to make a drab prison jumpsuit look stylish, although she didn't carry off handcuffs nearly as well as Emily did. She glanced over at Emily, watching as the redhead eyed her twin's fading split lip and bruised cheek with a look of satisfaction. She had even managed to see the echo of a black bruise under one of Katie's eyes, a fading scar on the side of her head.

"Hello, Bitch," Katie broke the silence first, a dangerous edge to her voice as she glared at her twin. Emily stared back, then down, then over at Naomi as she grasped for the blonde woman's hand under the table. Naomi offered her a small smile and squeezed her fingers, threading their hands together inside the sleeve of Naomi's gray hoodie, now wrapped around Emily like some kind of armor. "I don't get it, Katie," the redhead finally spoke, her voice quivering slightly, "how did you do it? Why can't I remember what happened to Gerald? Answer that and we never have to see each other again."

Katie leaned back, biting her lip thoughtfully as she drummed her fingers on the table, her long nails clacking on the cold metal. She looked over at Naomi and smiled sweetly, "Perhaps, perhaps someone slipped her some GHB. 1.2 grams, to be exact, maybe mixed in to a wine cooler or something. Worked like a charm the first time too - girl's a fucking lightweight." She smirked at the shocked expression on the blonde's face before turning back to her sister, clearly delighted as the redhead sputtered, "YOU killed Effy??"

"She was mine. You couldn't have her," Kate spat back, and smiled.

"You.. you didn't want her!" Emily was frazzled now and Naomi squeezed her fingers again.

"No, I didn't, but you still didn't get to take her from me." Katie was defiant.

Katie Fitch, as if there was any question, was an official fucking psychopath. Naomi had had researched, well, no, she had managed to almost read a whole Wikipedia article on the subject the previous week before being hauled back to bed again. _Use of charisma, manipulation, intimidation, sexual intercourse and violence_, she remembered, that was Katie Fitch to the letter.

"Gerald was a great fuck, if you weren't such a freak you would have realized it," Katie was getting angry now, "do you know what he said to me? He said 'Emily and I will work this out. I know it's complicated but I think I love her.' Now what fucking _loser_ would ever want you?"

"That's why you killed him? That was it?" This time it was Naomi's startled voice that filled the room. Katie looked over at her, her chocolate brown eyes laced with dangerous fury, "He was mine, too."

The elder twin turned back to her sister and said coldly, no mask on the hatred in her voice, "I take care of things. See how hard I tried to make everything normal? And you managed to fuck it up anyway. Jesus, _Ems_, you're pathetic. We found you moaning and crying and splashing around in that girl's blood and it took, like, three police officers to pull you off of her when you had only kissed once or something."

Naomi glanced over at the redhead beside her, finding that the smaller woman had turned a deeper shade of purple than Naomi even thought possible as she stared, no, glared back at her twin, her hand clutching the blonde's fingers desperately. The look of pure fury on Emily's face made Naomi's spine shiver involuntarily and she gripped the redhead's hand even more tightly.

"You're fucking going away forever you unbelievable, evil bitch!" Emily was shouting now.

"Well, that's a nice theory," Katie said quietly, as looked down at her fingernails, picking at the bright pink polish, clearly bored by her twin's emotional reaction.

"What? You're never getting out of here," the redhead was clearly startled, but continued to stare at her sister, now leaning back almost casually in her seat despite the elder twin's wrists remaining pinned to the table.

"Oh, I have a lawyer too.. and even though I'm not fucking mine," she looked pointedly at her sister, who returned her gaze defiantly, "he says they don't have much. I never admitted anything to you. Not really. And besides.. they never proved you didn't do it." Katie smirked.

The tension in the room cracked dangerously as Naomi looked from one nearly identical looking woman to the other - one furious, one clearly pleased at the misery all around her. Katie Fitch created chaos wherever she went, it seemed, but the blonde was mostly concerned by the devastating effect she had on her twin. She focused her deep blue eyes on Emily - on this person she needed so desperately, but who still seemed so lost - and watched as an untold number of emotions flashed across the redhead's face before finally settling on a slightly tight expression. Emily squared her shoulders and stood, pulling Naomi up along with her as she said in a surprisingly calm and even tone, "This is over. _We_ are over. I am never thinking about you ever again."

Katie looked momentarily shocked at her sister's declaration, before making a quick recovery and plastering a sneer back on her face, "Fuck you, Ems."

"Fuck you right back." And with that, Emily turned her back on her sister and left, dragging Naomi through the cell door behind her.

As they left the prison and stepped into the intense sunshine again, Naomi looked over at the redhead with worried eyes as she gripped her hand tightly and took in the slight frown on the smaller woman's face as she nibbled on her bottom lip, eyes faraway and deep in thought. Heart sinking, the blonde moved to lead them back to the car, back to whatever kind of life this would turn out to be after Katie_ Fucking_ Fitch had torn it all apart, when Emily pulled back on her hand. "Wait, Naomi, please wait."

The blonde turned back to face the redhead, now staring up at her with open yearning in her eyes. "There is one thing she didn't account for," Emily said, moving to close the bit of remaining space between them.

"What?" Naomi asked hesitantly.

"You.." Emily tangled her fingers into the blonde's wavy hair and pulled her in, kissing her with incredible longing, breathing her in and sinking into Naomi's tight embrace. The redhead pulled away after a long moment and sighed, ".. she didn't consider that you are completely mine."

"I love you," Naomi smiled happily as she pressed their foreheads together and pulled the smaller woman tighter.

"I know," Emily said simply, and that was enough for now.

X

_A/N - How did Katie lock the door from the inside? I don't know either - I think she might be a ninja. She's Katie Fucking Fitch after all. xD_

One more to go.. are those crazy kids gonna make it?


	20. Epilogue

_A/N - Here we are at last, everyone. *wails!* I'm going to miss this crazy bunch, but (ooh, spoiler!) don't you think it's about time we give them their (mostly) happy ending? I'm pretty sure I've tied up all the thousand remaining threads we had still pending, but if I missed one just assume whatever it was, Katie Fitch did it. Herein find redemption for some, grand romantic gestures, and what Cook's been up to since we left him shagging his way through Miami._

Epilogue - Bristol

Some months later, Emily Fitch and Naomi Campbell both stepped foot in Bristol for the first time in years and they held on to each other tightly as they watched the boats on the waterfront slowly dance by. Naomi turned and gave the redhead in her arms an easy smile. "Not so terrible after all, is it?" the blonde had asked, not really needing an answer because she already knew, but Emily nodded back at her happily before pulling her close and kissing her senseless.

Emily had changed since that ill-fated visit to Katie's prison cell, to Naomi's great relief was no longer wavering wildly between a shell of a person or a complete and utterly insatiable maniac, but had finally settled somewhere in the middle. _Finally a real person_, and Naomi loved this version of Emily most of all.

Naomi knew - and it ate at her sometimes at night, starting at the redhead's peaceful face as she slept beside her on crumpled purple sheets - that Katie Fitch would never be charged for Gerald Burton's brutal murder, the same complicated evidence and twisted theories that freed Emily would somehow keep the elder twin from going down as well. Charging either sister, she knew, was virtually impossible because the identical DNA would always carry with it reasonable doubt. That, and the prosecutor didn't have the spine or the balls to tangle with the real Katie Fucking Fitch, something Naomi could certainly empathize with, even if she didn't like it. She had the actual and virtual scars to prove it was the fight of a lifetime, and it was entirely unlikely that anyone but the psychopathic elder twin would win if they tangled with her now. She was more dangerous than ever.

Naomi had broken the thin and wiry prosecutor further, she knew, when she threatened to sue for false imprisonment if he pursued assault charges against Emily for attacking her twin in the courtroom that day it all exploded in spectacular fashion. Naomi knew her threat may not stick but it seemed to work, her icy glare punctuating the seriousness of her intent as he shrunk away out of the judge's chambers without a word.

Ironically, it was the assault on Naomi in open court that had finally stuck to the elder twin and kept Katie locked up, where the blonde wished she would just rot forever or better yet, disappear. She hated that it wouldn't be the case. Katie Fitch had plead to a deal for the attack that resulted in four years but would be out in less than two, Naomi knew, given the overcrowded and entirely wretched state of the prison system. Two short years was all Gerald's life was worth in the end it seemed, and the blonde often found herself silently thanking the man who had taken care of Emily for all that time before the blonde found her, could protect the little redhead herself.

Naomi quietly set about trying to figure out what had ever become of the investigation into the mysterious death of Effy Stonem, and the official letter with the police seal on the envelope made tears fill her deep blue eyes and roll down her face, splashing on the page as she read. The blonde sat alone in her apartment office the day it had arrived, had been slipped almost casually through the mailbox slot in the front door, and she glanced around the empty office, thanking her lucky stars that Emily was sleeping off one of their afternoon sessions and she wouldn't have to know the horrible truth.

Naomi was sad, was heartbroken that after her weeks of phone calls and letters to the Bristol Police Department to hear that there would be no investigation, that there was no way to prove that it wasn't an accident - now that they had searched the crime lab archives and found all relevant evidence had somehow, mysteriously vanished. The blonde knew, just knew in her bones that it must have been Katie Fitch - that if she would fuck a police dispatcher to track Emily down in the hospital the first day Naomi had ever encountered either twin, then she would certainly fuck a different one to steal evidence, too. Naomi couldn't accept that that the poor dead girl wouldn't get justice, her only real crime loving and being loved back by the redheaded younger twin in the face of Katie Fitch's fiery anger - something Naomi was unashamedly guilty of herself. Naomi vowed then that she would never stop trying to unravel the web the elder, positively _evil_ twin somehow continued to spin, even from her prison cell.

Naomi was brought back from her unhappy thoughts as Emily dipped her toes into the waterfront giggling loudly as the swans swam suddenly away, and then expectantly toward her again. The blonde laughed and watched her with sparkling blue eyes until Naomi spied a syringe floating along side the swimming birds and she pulled the redhead toward her protectively. _Oh Bristol, never change._ The taller woman pulled the redhead tight, and kissed her fiercely in the whipping wind, as she remembered the first moment when she knew Emily had picked herself back up from the devastating events of the past years and had finally come home to her completely.

Naomi hadn't ever stopped telling Emily she loved her - no longer even surprised that the words came out of her mouth so easily and so often - yet she knew the redhead hadn't ever said it back, always responding with "I know" or a sudden kiss, but the blonde didn't care. She knew, she lived the depth of the redhead's feeling for her, but it surprised her and melted her heart all the same - the day she heard Emily say it out loud at last. It was her birthday, Naomi remembered.

They had spent the day in bed, of course, their messy hair and stupid grins matching as they stared at each other in the waning afternoon sunlight, when Emily suddenly turned away and presented the curious blonde with a small blue package produced from the drawer on the table on her side of the bed. The taller woman met the redhead's excited face, looking curiously at her for a long moment at the amusement dancing in her chocolate eyes. She pulled open the box to find a single pair of handcuffs staring back up at her.

"Emily!" the Naomi's eyes practically popped out of her head at the sight.

"Too soon?" The redhead was coming undone with giggles now, "I couldn't let you be the one to have _all_ the fun."

Blue eyes stared back at her, speechless.

"Oh, and Happy Birthday, _ya big softie_," the redhead whispered as she suddenly produced a second present, this one a simple piece of paper.

"I love you, Naomi Campbell," Emily Fitch said for the first time, leaning over to the blonde and kissing her deeply. Naomi broke the kiss, looking down at the page in her hands, and gasped, the breath stolen from her chest at the sight. She stared for a long moment at a printout of a press release, dated that day, announcing the formation of the Campbell-Fitch Foundation for International Legal Services.

"I had to put my name in there so nobody thought it was the model trying to clothe the unfashionable or something," the redhead explained, wide grin on her face as she watched pure and utter delight splash across the face of the woman she loved, "it will fund free legal aid for political and international refugees, one thing that is quite near and dear to my heart." Naomi's eyebrows rose in question as Emily added, "It's all worked out, don't worry."

The blonde stared back, grin still on her face but questions in her eyes, "How did you manage all this?"

Emily pushed the taller woman back on the bed and straddled her hips with her naked thighs. "My new attorney," she said, suddenly peppering kisses over the blonde's amused face, "manages my money. And thank your lucky stars that he is a sweaty, horrible man, and I won't be even remotely tempted to snog him."

"When did that happen?" was all the surprised blonde could utter, her attention suddenly drawn to the achingly slow way the redhead was grinding her hips and sucking on her earlobe.

"I could set my watch by your running schedule, _Naoms_. And I pay him enough to make house calls even that early in the morning."

Emily threaded a gentle finger from Naomi's lips, down her neck, stopping to tease a hard nipple. "The Burton family gave the first rather obscenely large donation, I gave the second. Your endowment sits somewhere in the hundreds of millions, and will come to the rescue of untold numbers of lost souls," she casually explained as she moved her lips to hover over Naomi's breast, looking pleased with herself as she watched the flush creeping up the blonde's naked chest as her hot breath danced across the taller woman's skin. She looked back up suddenly, locking eyes with the blonde as she smirked and said softly, "You're fired - as my attorney that is. And I'm serious about those handcuffs."

The blonde always knew, instinctively, but it was confirmed for her that day that there was definitely more to Emily Fitch than meets the eye. Naomi Campbell couldn't wait to spend the rest of her life exploring the world together and finding out exactly what that mystery was.

They walked hand in hand through the city streets of Bristol as night fell and their cold breath became visible against the night air. Finally reaching their destination, the blonde pushed through the old wooden door and smiled at the sight of Cook behind the bar, waggling his tongue at some scantily clad and probably barely-legal college girl. _Oh Cook, never change._

"My favorite globe-totting lesbians! Back to the motherland at last!" Cook shouted over at them, and Naomi grinned back at him wildly, before her eyes caught a photo pasted up behind the bar and her face fell. A photo of Katie _Fucking_ Fitch in prison garb, mugging sexily for the camera. "What?!" the blonde pointed violently behind Cook's head and he followed her finger before turning back around with a huge smile on his face and amusement in his eyes.

"What?" he said innocently, before laughing violently and pulling the photo off the bar, staring at it for a long adoring moment, "just a little something Katiekins thoughtfully included in one of her letters."

Naomi's eyebrows raised in exasperation as she asked him, "You do realize that Psychopathy is an actual disorder, yea?" Emily just rolled her eyes and squeezed the tense blonde tighter in reassurance.

"Come on, babes, I couldn't help myself," he pleaded, "oh yeah, and I kinda visited her in prison for a while before popping back over here. _Conjugal visits_ are the greatest thing ever invented!" He howled in laughter as Naomi let out an exasperated sigh.

"Besides, it's a good long while before she gets out, right?" he asked, "Right?!"

This time Naomi just smirked back at him, "Sure."

"Everybody needs love, yeah?" Cook was grinning again, "Even the most horrible, the biggest fuck-ups among us!"

Cook sometimes made the most sense when he was doing the craziest things. Naomi smiled as looked down at Emily, her deep eyes staring back up at her in adoration as the blonde pulled the redhead closer. _Yeah, I guess so._

The End

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A/N - TWISTS UNTIL THE VERY END, HUH? There we go, kids! Applause for all and /bows out. Thanks for sharing this journey with me._

Well, what's next? There is an upcoming crackfic collaboration with the exceptional and ever-so-talented LuvActually (/it's happening), and then maybe a Bodyguard-inspired AU (did somebody say stalker?) or perhaps even a cross-country crime spree drama. I don't know! Mostly I just need a nap - it's 1:30 AM! In any case, I promise in all my future fics that Effy and Katie will both have a good time because they certainly went through the wringer in this one. Sorry girls. Not that Katie Fucking Fitch wasn't exceptionally fun to write on the far edge of sanity, but we'll give her a break for now. Maybe we'll bring this bunch back out for a Christmas special or something.. nothing says the holidays like our favorite murdering psychopath.


End file.
